Harry spends the day at Boo's house, curled up with her on the sofa while they binge watch reruns of romcoms. It's been weeks since Boo laughs as hard or as genuinely as she does with Harry; after such a taxing morning, she's grateful to let her mind unravel for a few hours with some mind-numbing television. He makes her dinner and she gets wine drunk while he cooks, accidentally blurting out several times how nice she thinks his butt is. Every time he merely flashes her that crooked grin that makes her melt.

Just before eleven at night, Harry makes his exit. Boo escorts him to the front door, keeping a knitted white blanket pulled tight around her shoulders while she watches him through half-lidded eyes.

He smiles at her, dimples poking into his smooth cheeks. "Are you going to be alright tonight?" he asks, his voice taking on a soft edge. Boo sniffles and nods sleepily.

"Yeah," she murmurs. "If the police won't help me, then I'll figure this out myself."

"Atta girl," Harry grins, gently nudging her chin with his fist as an encouraging gesture. She offers him a small smile in return.

"Call me in the morning, okay?" he says, sounding hopeful. She nods again, blinking rapidly to fight back the overwhelming urge to yawn.

He turns and begins to venture down the front steps when her small hand reaches out and lightly brushes his forearm.

"Thank you, Harry," she says solemnly. "You don't know what it means to have someone believe me."

"I loved her too, you know," he answers, to her surprise. "She was a good neighbor and a good friend, even when people decided to turn their back on me. She loved without judgement and if something really did happen to her, I want to know what it is."

Boo can't help the smile that stretches across her face. "Thank you," she blubbers again. "I wish she'd told me about you. I wish I'd known you when she was . . . well, you know."

"She respected my privacy, and I'll be eternally grateful for that," Harry replies. "But yes, I wish we'd met sooner."

He hesitates before leaning in and planting a kiss on her full cheek. Her heart races in glee as she watches him descend the porch steps and return to his car. She waits until he drives away, keeping the blanket wound tightly around her shoulders as she waves goodbye. Even in the moonlight, she knows her face must be bright red.

« • »

Harry waves into his rearview mirror until he turns the corner at the end of Boo's street and can no longer see her, standing on her porch looking like a tired angel.

Once her sweet face is out of view, he pulls over and parks beside the empty road. He fishes his phone from his pocket and scrolls through his contacts until he sees the name he's looking for: Brett Loughton.

Brett picks up after the third ring, his boisterous voice booming into Harry's ear.

"Harry, my God!" he slurs, clearly drunk. In the background is the chaos of people laughing and glasses clinking. "It's been so long, how the hell are you?"

It's actually only been about two weeks since they had a brief encounter at the police station after Harry was unfairly arrested, but clearly that occurrence had slipped Brett's mind. Just as well too; he didn't have the kindest reaction to seeing Harry standing there in handcuffs.

"I'd better not see you down here again," Brett had hissed as he uncuffed Harry. He'd jabbed a finger roughly into his chest and locked eyes with Harry. "I thought I made it very clear that you were to keep your nose clean."

Harry musters up a chuckle. "I'm alright, mate, sounds like you are too. I thought we could grab a drink and catch up."

"Hey, fuck yeah, of course! I'm down at O'Malley's right now, come through! Some of the boys are here with me, they'd love to see ol' Party-Hard Harry!"

A drunken roar of approval sounds on the other end of the phone, drowning out the remainder of Brett's sentence. He cheers in agreement and yells something obfuscated to someone on the other end.

"Yeah, I'll be there in a bit then," Harry says coolly, already pulling back out onto the road.

Brett slurs out more indistinguishable words before abruptly hanging up the phone. Harry steels himself as he pulls onto the main road, heading for downtown Jack Creek.

« • »

A deafening cry greets him as he swings open the door to O'Malley's. At least twelve people all cheer and slur out his name as he pushes open the door to finding the evening atmosphere alight; the smoky air smells of cigars and cheap beer, and across the room someone is belting out a pitched version of Rocketman.

Harry spots Brett at the far end of the bar, standing by a group of occupied tables and waving him in. An ear-to-ear grin is on his face and a half-empty pint is clutched loosely in his hand.

"Harry!" he cries as Harry walks closer. "You made it!"

"Hey, Brett," Harry says genially as he reaches the table surrounded by several of his former college buddies. "How are you?"

Brett doesn't have time to answer before Harry roughly grabs his collar, lifts him off the ground, and slams his back down against the tabletop. Glass shatters and beer sprays all over the floor as the air is filled with alarmed gasps and the frenzied sound of chairs scraping. Every eye in the bar immediately circles in on Harry and Brett. Rocketman stops his background crooning and the air goes quiet with tension.

"Woah, Harry, what the fuck?" Brett cries, eyes wide as he hits the table. Harry towers over him with dark narrowed eyes and a clenched jaw.

Three of Brett's friends jump to their feet and flank Harry, reaching to pull him off before Brett stops them.

"It's cool, guys, it's cool," he says, sounding much more sober than moments before. He glowers up at Harry and says, "What's going on, man? We got a problem?"

Harry shakes his head. "No problem. I just wanted to ask you what the hell was going through your mind when you pulled that stunt with Boo this afternoon."

Brett pauses, stunned by Harry's words, before breaking into a drunken sneer. "The freak sent you?" he jeers through his sick smile. "Man, she practically attacked me and demanded I investigate her grandmother's death. Came at me with some crackpot conspiracy theory about how someone killed her!"

The crowd around them relaxes into low laughter as Brett speaks. Harry remains steadfast, keeping his hands clenched tightly around Brett's collar as he continues to stare him down.

"So, are you going to?" he asks calmly.

"Fuck no!" Brett spits, as though it's the most obvious answer in the world. "You expect me to put my career on the line like that? For someone like her? She has no proof and besides, it was a category four hurricane. It's a wonder more people didn't die."

Harry stays eerily silent as Brett rolls his eyes.

"She needs to pull herself together and get over it. And you," he says, pushing Harry off him and coming to his full height, "need to back away from me before I arrest you for assaulting an officer."

His fingers pull up the hem of his shirt, revealing a concealed handgun tucked into the waistband of his pants. Harry retains his stony expression as Brett takes his turn getting into Harry's face.

"You should leave now," he says in a dark voice. "There's no business for you here."

Harry, unafraid, doesn't budge.

"Are you stupid?" Brett cries. "I don't want to arrest you, for old times' sake, but if you and the freak are planning on interfering with police investigations then I'm going to have to."

"Her name is Boo," Harry replies lightly. A smirk plays at the ends of his lips. "Or Melita, if you're feeling formal. And you'll need some proof if you're going to arrest anyone."

The bar is deadly quiet. The music is long gone. No one breathes, no one moves, just waiting for Brett and Harry to pounce on one another and begin the brawl.

But it doesn't happen. Harry merely nods his head, tosses Brett a five from his pocket, and says calmly, "Have a beer, on me. You look like you've had a rough day, Detective."

With that, he turns and exits O'Malley's without so much as a glance back.

i'm sorry for not updating for almost two weeks but i've been having a difficult time with wattpad lately, nobody is reading this story so i'm debating whether or not to keep writing it lmao i like it but i'm not sure.

anyhow, how was your day? what have you been up to since we last talked? are you celebrating any holiday this season? x