a/n: over an hour late today, i was desperately trying to find someone to get me the Pleasing beach tote, why lie .. also follow me on twt @/nikeystyles to see sneak peeks <3

    I woke up to light shining on my face. Rubbing my eyes, I was incredibly confused, jumping up when I realized I was in an unfamiliar bed. My breathing increased almost immediately, and I found myself glancing around hurriedly, though as I looked around the room it was vaguely familiar. There were photos on the dresser of what looked like a younger Harry and his mother, a sigh leaving my lips when I realized where I was. Izabelle was in the bed beside me, the cat meowing softly as she sleepily stared at me.

"Hi," I murmured, petting Izabelle.

Izabelle moved to sit on my lap, and I was kind of surprised that she was so interested in touch. After all, most female cats didn't like it much, but I knew that boy cats liked touch a lot. However, it was different here. That, or Izabelle just really liked me. I sat in bed petting Izabelle for what was probably ten minutes before I had to use the bathroom. Getting out of bed, I found myself very confused for a second when I opened the door, trying to understand which hallway I was in. Though, it soon became apparent when I realized he had placed me in one of the bedrooms off his wing of the house, leaving me to quickly use the bathroom.

After I used the bathroom, I walked to his bedroom, pushing the door open. The other door to his closet was broken now, and I raised an eyebrow, wondering how he could be so angry at something. Brushing it off, I grabbed my toothbrush and toothpaste, quickly going to brush my teeth. However, I noticed a tissue on the counter that looked like it had traces of dried up blood, my eyes narrowing on it as I brushed my teeth. It seemed weird, but when I glanced in the trash I saw a bunch of broken glass so I wondered if he had hurt himself again.

After I threw the tissue out and finished brushing my teeth, I headed out to the kitchen. Harry was definitely cooking, the savory smell prominent as I walked through the living room to the kitchen. It was even more apparent when I entered his navy blue kitchen. The curly-haired personality was wearing only a black pair of boxers, my eyes focused on his tattoos. They always looked so striking against his sun kissed skin, and for a brief moment I continued to stare before I opened the fridge.

"Good morning."

"Mm," I hummed.

Continuing to stare into the fridge, a part of me wanted a glass of orange juice and then some of the freshly picked strawberries, but there was another part of me that didn't want to eat at all. I felt kind of sick, honestly, my eyes not even near glancing in his direction. Though, after plenty of standing in front of the fridge and debating, I just shut it, looking at the things clipped to the fridge as if they were super interesting. He had a couple magnetic letters, a grocery list, as well as a picture of Izabelle hanging up. I always thought it was weird how sentimental he seemed to be when he could usually brush stuff off so easily, but I blamed it on the fact that he had lost his mother and probably didn't want to take anything for granted.

"You're mad," he stated.

"Something like that."

"I get weird when I'm high," he continued. "I'm sorry."

I glanced at him. "I didn't know weird and mean were synonyms now."

"Magdalina, I didn't mean it."

"You didn't mean it?" I laughed bitterly. "Harry, I don't give a fuck about what you meant."

"But I—"

"No," I scoffed. "I shouldn't have expected anything different from you."

I glanced at him long enough to see that his body had stiffened. My words had most definitely poked at his ego, but I didn't care at all because I had cried myself to sleep last night and that wasn't right. Grabbing a glass out of the cabinet, I got myself water, walking over to the table and sitting down. There were several books sitting on the table top, and I grabbed the one that looked most interesting, beginning to read. He didn't try to talk to me as he cooked, which I was thankful for him realizing that I was not in the mood to speak to him. Though, he was eventually setting a plate down in front of me, my eyes glancing up at him.

"I'm not hungry."

"Baby," he said softly.

"Don't," I told him, disliking that the first time he had used such a sweet word was when I was irritated with him. "Not after yesterday. I want to go home whenever you put some clothes on."

"You aren't really this upset."

I grabbed a napkin to mark the place in the book, shutting it. I folded my hands over the book as well, staring up at him without any give in emotions. Was he seriously this incompetent? I thought he was smarter than this? It was like everything that happened yesterday was wiped from his memory, but it was still very clearly in mine. How could someone act so incredibly poorly toward someone and then think it would just be fine and brushed over the very next day?

"I have every right to be this upset with you. You yelled at me multiple times. You put your hands on me. You dropped me on your front porch and then kicked the keys at me like I was scum. I don't like that, Harry, and I am certainly not okay with it either. I had a shitty boyfriend once already. If I wanted to be treated like shit, I would have begged for him back."

His eyebrows pulled in. It was clear that he was incredibly confused, and I was starting to second guess what I was saying to him. Even if I didn't show it, his expression made me feel like maybe what I said didn't actually happen. A piece of me was going to begin spiraling in his kitchen if I was making up the events that had taken place last night. There was no way, right? I wouldn't have made that up. At least, I was almost certain that I wouldn't have. I took a deep breath, about to continue when he shook his head.

"I put my hands on you?" he asked. "When?"

"You didn't want me to walk home last night."

He looked at me as if to ask if I was serious. "You're mad over that? I picked you up like that because you were being insane then. You started running away. There is literally a serial killer out there and you're acting like there isn't. He keeps killing girls that look like you. Why is it so bad that I didn't want you to walk home all alone?"

"Wouldn't be the first time someone tried to kill me."

Harry froze completely. I could tell he didn't like to hear the information in the slightest. But, again, something was incredibly off with him. He was being weird, yet again. I couldn't tell what his deal was, but it wasn't even like he could blame it on being high. He was literally sober, so why was he acting weird? Then again, he was always saying he wanted to protect me, so maybe it had something to do with that.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"I'm not talking about it. I'm just telling you that I can fight my own battles. Now can you hurry up and eat so I can get home?"

He sighed loudly, as if he was irritated with me. I took a deep breath, beginning to read the book that I had been skimming through not too long ago. However, I found myself glaring at Harry when he sat down with his breakfast in the seat beside me. I probably would have even allowed it had he not tried to slide my chair closer to his. However, he did exactly that and I found myself shifting out of the seat I was currently in so that I could sit at the head of the table instead.

"Are you being serious?"

"No, I'm joking around. I actually love starting my morning off with musical chairs," I told him, my tone bitter.

"Great. And now you have an attitude. Perfect. This is just fucking perfect."

I watched as he stood up from his chair in a haste, Harry walking over to the sink and throwing his plate into the sink. It made a loud noise, and when Harry looked in the sink he just shouted a curse before he shook his head and stormed out of the kitchen. I cleared my throat, marking the place in the book I was reading once again before I got up to see what was in the sink myself.

A part of me wanted to feel bad that he had just made himself and I breakfast, but I had irritated him so much that he wasn't even hungry anymore. Though, that wasn't my issue at this moment—especially not with his attitude or the way that he was treating me. Sighing to myself, I got up from my chair at the table before walking over to the sink to see that the dish had broken. Frowning, I found myself carefully pulling the pieces of the broken dish out of the sink and setting them on the counter.

As I grabbed my stuff from the living room, I was still confused as to how I had woken up in a bedroom. It wasn't like I had made my way there last night, and Harry had made no mention of it to me. Then again, if he was acting like almost nothing had happened yesterday, I felt like he had probably moved me in order to try and get in my good graces. Tugging on my shorts that I had worn last night, I then headed to his bedroom. He was grabbing a shirt out of his very broken closet, and while all I wanted to do was collect my belongings, he glanced at me, pointing to me.

"What?"

"Are you wearing that home?" he asked.

"The shorts or the shirt? Why? Is something wrong?"

"Yeah something's wrong," he nodded. "If we're being over dramatic this morning, I want my shirt back."

I was the one overly pissed now. How could he say that to me? Not only was he the one that offered the shirt to me last night, but he also was the reason that we were even fighting in the first place. It was absolutely ridiculous at this point, and I wanted him to genuinely fuck off, but I knew he still had to take me home. Even if I wanted to call someone to come and get me instead, I would still have to wait around until they got here. But, that didn't mean he had to be rude about a shirt.

"You're being a prick," I told him.

"Well, you're a bitch."

I stared at him, my mouth agape and I could tell that he was even surprised by what he said, his eyebrows raised and his eyes were wide. Shaking my head, I haphazardly grabbed a T-shirt out of my bag, practically sprinting to the bathroom and slamming the door shut behind me. I was embarrassed, to say the least. How could I have been so dumb as to trust him? Sure, I had my fair share of experiences with men, but they had all been decent to me after I had been vulnerable with them. This just felt like a stab in the back. He was all for not wanting to be used, but I felt very used right now.

Of course, if I had a bra on I wouldn't have cared about changing in his room just to get it over with, but since I didn't, I wasn't really in the mood to show him my boobs right now. Especially since he was being such a complete piece of shit to me. Grabbing my tooth brush, I dried it off on my shirt, staring at myself in the mirror for a few moments. My face was flushed, and I felt like I even looked stressed out. It was unbelievable how my mood had changed so much this morning, and I felt sick knowing that he was the reason. Swallowing hard, I decided to wash my face in an effort to try and calm my nerves, turning on the sink.

"Magdalina," Harry knocked.

I didn't answer. I didn't feel like I needed to answer him after the way that he was treating me. I mean, what kind of guy called the person he claimed he wasn't mad at a bitch? Sure, I had just called him a prick but it felt deserved. Then again, maybe I was no better than him at this point. Rolling my eyes at myself for overthinking the way that I was always so great at doing, I decided that I couldn't be anymore wrong than he was, especially after what he had put me through last night.

"Answer the door," he knocked again.

"What is your issue?" I asked loudly.

"My issue is you locking yourself in my bathroom," he told me quickly.

"Okay?" I scoffed. "And?"

"And I don't fucking like that."

"Oh no. What are you going to do, cry about it?"

I heard the door handle jiggle, and I really could not believe that he was acting like this right now. Why was he freaking out over me being in his bathroom? Grunting at the thought of him being such a child, I found myself shutting the sink off once I had washed and dried my face, my eyes wide when Harry somehow managed to get the door open. I stared at him with wide eyes, quickly turning around and throwing the shirt he had so desperately wanted me to take off right at his face.

"Stop it!" he screamed.

I was staring at him, absolutely terrified. He was pissed–so pissed and I was worried that maybe I had managed to fuck up. Last night he had been cold, calm, and very collected. Right now, he was shaking with anger, his voice held malice, and I had never been so scared of someone in my entire life. Even if I had run away from a killer before, this was different than that. This felt scary in a different way. Swallowing hard, I backed up into a table, my eyes wide when a vase from the table fell onto the ground and shattered.

"Can't do anything right," he scoffed. "Don't move."

I wanted to bite back–say something else to him–but I knew he was right at that moment. My feet were bare and they would one-hundred percent get cut up if I didn't listen to him right now, but I was frustrated. I wanted to escape the place that he called home. I had never been so frightened before, and I just kept thinking about how he was yelling at me, how he had broken into the bathroom because I locked the door, how this was the man who I thought I saw a future with and it was very quickly being flushed right down the drain. My breathing picked up when he came into the bathroom with a pair of Vans on, Harry setting the broom by the counter and walking toward me.

Crouching down, I decided, for whatever reason, that I should try to pick up some of the glass. It was the best idea to me, considering the fact that I certainly did not want him to pick me up by any means. I didn't want him to touch me, which, since I would have done nearly anything for him to hold me any other time, was saying a whole lot about what he had done to me.

"Don't touch the glass," he quickly said.

I didn't listen, not in the slightest. And, of course I should have. Of course there should have been some small voice telling me to listen to him, but a much louder one was saying not to listen to him after the way he had been acting. By some horrible joke that someone must have been playing on me, I cut my middle finger, the blood almost instantly beginning to drip on the floor and down my arm.

"Fuck," Harry grunted. "I-I'm going to be sick."

"Sick?" I asked.

He didn't say anything else, just threw a towel at me before he opened the door to the toilet room and started puking. I didn't think that this morning could get any worse than it was already. My body was shaking, I was scared, I was upset, and I was frustrated. It was like the world was against me for some weird reason and I was just stuck in this stupid spot in his bathroom.

He threw up for probably close to five minutes, and I was incredibly confused now. A part of me thought that he was over the blood thing—that it was finished since the party at Mr. Watson's house for work. Yet here he was, vomiting into the toilet after I had cut my finger and he had seen. It made absolutely no sense to me how his brain worked, but I just stood with the glass around me, holding my finger tightly inside the towel.

He looked pale, his eyes a stark comparison to his nearly white skin tone. I swallowed hard, watching as he brushed his teeth before he walked over to me. It was horrifying to be scared of someone who I thought that I had cared about. I didn't like this feeling in the slightest. And yet, I found myself shuddering when he inched closer.

"D-Don't," I murmured quietly.

"I'm just going to move you to the sink."

"Don't touch me," I whispered.

He immediately realized what he had done wrong in that moment. I could see it in his eyes, the way that his jaw clenched, his hands balled into fists. I didn't want him to touch me at all. I was so frightened that I felt like I was possibly unsafe in his arms. However, I also knew that there was glass by my feet and the idea of him not being able to get it all if I was in the way was also very well a possibility.

"You don't have shoes on. I don't want you to cut your feet."

I glanced up at him.

"I'll put you right down," he tried, his voice much softer now. "Come on."

"I don't like you."

"I know," he said.

I was shaking when he picked me up, Harry walking with me over to the sink. I had anticipated him to set me down and move from behind me, but instead he placed me in front of the sink and stood right behind me. I wanted to say something—tell him to leave me alone. But I was also wondering if he was doing this because he would want to move me to his bedroom as well.

I removed the towel from my hand, grimacing when I noticed the amount of blood on the towel even though there wasn't all that much dripping from my finger any longer. Harry squeezed his eyes shut behind me for a few seconds before he took a deep breath and threw the towel elsewhere in the bathroom. I swallowed hard, watching as he squirted soap into his palm before his arms came up and under mine.

"Don't," I murmured.

"Shh."

"Y-You're so mean to me."

He didn't say anything to me, just washed my hand the way that he had in the past. I started crying, Harry basically ignoring how distraught I was, but he still tried to take care of me even if I was miserable this morning. It wasn't long until he was drying my hand off, grabbing a band-aid from under the sink and putting it around my finger. Soon enough, he was taking me out of the bathroom, placing me in his bedroom.

The second my feet touched the carpet I let go of him, about to walk away from him when he caught my face in his hand. It was weird how I used to not mind when he held my face like this–his thumb on one side of my face while his fingers grasped the other side. Though, it was clear that there was even animosity behind the touch now and I was not having it in the slightest.

"You better be ready to leave by the time I'm done cleaning up, do you understand?"

"Loud and clear," I muttered, pushing his hand away from me before I wiped my tears.

He clenched his jaw, but I watched as he walked back into the bathroom. A part of me still could not believe what he was doing to me. I was terrified, to be honest. I just kept thinking it over and over in my head. I knew that he could be scary at times, but never did I think he would be scary toward me in the slightest. Taking a few deep breaths, I found myself collecting my belongings, making sure that everything was packed up. Harry walked out of the bathroom with a broom in his hand and the dust pan in the other. I watched as he left the room, coming back a few moments later.

"Ready?"

"To get away from you? Absolutely."

"Literally stop," Harry said. "If you can't take it, don't dish it."

"What?" I scoffed. "You broke into the bathroom because I locked the door!"

"I didn't know what you were doing," he continued.

"So what? It was the bathroom!"

"Stop yelling at me."

"Holy shit," I laughed bitterly. "How am I the one in the wrong here for yelling at you when you are being impossible? Do you think that I want to feel like this with you, Harry? You're so funny."

He let out a deep sigh, walking over to the bathroom door. I watched as he grabbed the shirt I had thrown at his face earlier, picking it up off the floor before he placed it in the hamper. It was confusing to me when I noticed that he then grabbed my bag, carrying it out of the room for me. It seemed weird, especially since he was being so rude this morning, but I just brushed it off. I walked out of the bedroom, seeing Harry grab my stuff off the floor of the living room and shove it in the bag before he grabbed his keys off the table by the door and headed outside. I went to the kitchen to grab my bag of strawberries, not worried about anything else that had been purchased yesterday morning. But, when I walked outside and shut the door behind me, Harry raised an eyebrow.

"Those aren't all yours."

"Uh, what?" I asked.

"The strawberries. I wanted some."

"Okay," I stated, taking out three from the bag and handing them to him.

He stared at me. "You know you're not being any better than me, right? You're just as bad."

"I don't care. Act like a child, I'll act like one back. What did you just say? If you can't take it, don't dish it."

"You know what? Have the whole fucking bag."

I didn't know how it had turned from us being mad to basically trying to irritate the other more. It was definitely not the way that I wanted things to go, but here we were. Harry and I got in the car, the ride to my house filled with loud music and the windows down. He was being absolutely impossible, and I felt like I was going to go crazy. Or, maybe I was going crazy, I had no idea. I was stuck with so many emotions, shocked that I was even willingly sitting in this vehicle right now after everything that had taken place within the last twelve hours. Less than a day and he had gone from being one of the best people ever to one of the scariest men I think I had ever been faced with in my life. And that was saying a lot.

Once we reached my house, I found myself getting out of the car as quickly as I could. I had no need to interact with him. I didn't want to play nice after everything. Instead, I quickly grabbed my bags out of the trunk, leaving it open and basically sprinting up to my house. I wanted to be left alone. I didn't want to see him anymore. Breathing quickly, my fingers were shaking. I glanced over my shoulder to see that he was shutting the trunk, his jaw tense as I glanced back at the door and quickly slid the key into the lock. God seemed to be on my side for a moment as I began to get into my house, nearly shutting the door when I felt it slam against something hard.

"Fuck," he cursed.

"Go away."

"I still care about you."

"Harry, I don't care how you feel."

He was so much stronger than me. I knew this. I would always know this. And yet he was only using enough force to keep the door open. I knew he had the strength to get into my house, yet he wasn't using all of his strength. I wondered why. I wondered if there was a reason. I wondered if he knew he had messed up really badly and was trying to not be a complete dick to me, even if I felt that he already had reached that status.

"Just listen."

"I did enough listening this morning," I told him. "I am almost certain that is the worst anyone has ever treated me. I didn't even do anything to you, but you just kept making it worse."

"Let me talk to you for a minute."

"How about no?"

He grunted loudly. I was already exhausted after everything that had happened, so I wasn't sure how much more of this I could really take. Breathing deeply, I tried to think of what I could do in order to get him to go away. I needed space. I needed him to leave me alone. I needed him to go away. It hurt to think that after feeling so great with him I had such a big change in emotions toward him. I wasn't even sure what he could do in order to change my feelings toward him, actually. I felt crushed that someone I had cared about so quickly and so greatly was now someone that I felt unsafe with.

"Magdalina."

"Magdalina, nothing. Go away, Harry, I'm exhausted."

He groaned loudly, and finally I felt the door shut. It had caught me off guard, and I definitely stumbled, but I was thankful that he had left me alone. However, as I looked down at my bags I realized that I had forgotten my actual purse, knowing that my keys had been in my overnight bag. Groaning to myself, I found myself pulling my door open, Harry already standing outside of his car with the bag that I was missing.

"I still care about you," he said again.

"Whatever," I told him, watching as he started walking up to my house with the bag in his hand now.

"Don't be like that."

"I have every right to be like this."

Harry sighed. He was standing on my front porch now, the bag in his hands in front of him. I was staring down at my bag, hating that it was being held hostage in this situation. I could not believe that I had forgotten something so important in my eagerness to get away from him, but of course this would happen. Something like this always happened and it infuriated me to an extreme.

He sighed yet again. "I'll call you later."

"You don't have to."

"Come on."

"You're not just getting off with a little apology. I'm serious. I have told you about my ex and how controlling he was and now you? Yelling at me, calling me names, putting your hands on me? All of that is incredibly unacceptable, Harry, and I am not okay with any of it. Not in the slightest."

He was pushing his fingers through his hair and I could see he was stressed with the words I had just said to him. It was taking everything in me not to give in because I hated seeing him stressed like this. But, then I would think about what he did. He had dropped me on his front porch last night. He had called me a bitch. He had scared me so much that I knocked something over in his bathroom. I liked him so much it was sickening to even think that he had done these things to me. Even if it had really only been a week, we had known each other for longer and he had always been kind to me. I was certain that was why this was so difficult right now. I was simply in shock that someone who I had admired so much had acted so incredibly disrespectful toward me. Even still though, I didn't enjoy seeing him in such a state of distress right now. But, I knew I needed to stand my ground today. I couldn't give in, no matter how much I wanted to.

"Magdalina," he said softly.

"No. I'm serious."

"Fine, just let me—"

I was surprised when he set my bag on the floor of my house, my eyes narrowing as he stood back up. I thought that would be it–that he would walk away and leave me to try and enjoy what was left of my weekend. However, I was shocked when he hugged me, his face very quickly hiding in the crook of my neck like he hadn't just called me a bitch a little more than a half hour ago. I didn't move to hug him, my arms stuck at my sides but I could feel how tense he was against me. He didn't want this. He was doing it because he thought I did and it made it so much harder to be frustrated with him. But, again, anytime I thought that I would quickly be reminded of what he had done to put us in this situation and suddenly I could recall why I was being this way with him.

"Stop," I told him.

"Just hold on one—"

"I said stop," I told him, Harry letting go quickly and looking incredibly anxious. "Listen to me."

"Magdalina," he murmured.

"You messed up. You hurt me yesterday and that isn't okay, and now you're not listening to me again. I'm so serious when I say you have to reevaluate what you did and your actions and fix them."

He was shaking at this point, and it was the worst I felt in a while. I knew he was scared, and worried, and upset. But, I also knew that he had treated me poorly and I wasn't about to give in to that kind of behavior. I didn't want him to think that it was remotely okay to do to me. As he stared at me, I could see his frustration grow more again, the anxiety leaving him as anger fueled him. And once more I realized why I hadn't hugged him back.

"Fine, fine, whatever. I'll let you be angry at me, but you're being dramatic. I didn't want you to get killed, God forbid if that's a crime. I am so deeply sorry that I put my hands on you so you wouldn't walk away into the dark abyss that was the street last night. Have a good fucking day, Maggie."

Maggie. He never called me that. I was almost certain he had never called me that once since we met. Sure, he told people to call me that, but he never called me that. It wasn't the name he liked to use for me, and I was surprised at how I felt after he had used it. It stung more than I thought it would, Harry storming off to his car after the words. Though I remembered what the officer had told me yesterday, deciding that I should just remind him in case he forgot because he had been such a dick last night.

"Don't forget to fix your tail light!"

He didn't say anything to me. He didn't even acknowledge that I had said something to him in the first place. Instead, he slammed his car door shut, starting the vehicle as I fully made my way inside, hopefully to have a peaceful weekend. Or, what was left of it anyway.

•••

When I walked into work the following day, I was incredibly confused. My eyebrows pulled in at the dark studio, noting that it was the first time in the months I had worked here that it wasn't lit up. But, I also had no idea why this would have even happened. He was always at work. He was always here when I got here. Actually, he was almost always a few minutes away from a recap when I got here, and yet the lights were off, there was no one in the studio, and I found myself giving Grenadine a brief wave before I made it upstairs. Setting my things in my office, I wondered if I should go to his office and see if he was over there. But, I also wondered if that was what he would want. Deciding it was better to go ask Mr. Watson, I also remembered I had a question about the newsletter I wanted to work on for the following week so it made sense.

Heading downstairs, I made my way down the hall to his office. It didn't take long to knock on the door, Mr. Watson greeting me happily and stepping out of the way so that I could walk into his office. He shut the door behind us, Mr. Watson sitting at his desk while I sat in one of the plushy ones in front of him. Taking a deep breath, I watched as he shuffled some of the papers on his desk so that they were in a neat pile instead of spread around on the desk, clearing his throat before he looked at me.

"What do I owe the pleasure?"

"I had a few questions about the newsletter."

"Absolutely," he nodded. "I'm all ears."

"Perfect," I nodded. "Well, Harry was telling me that some people write to him and give clues while others write to him and they're just fan letters. I was thinking if I mention something about specific colored envelopes, it might help him decipher them easier."

Mr. Watson nodded. "That's not a bad idea. I like it. It would probably save him time, too. Not to say that he wouldn't want to read through all of those letters, but I know that he said he is getting a whole lot of mail. So, if he is specifically looking for clues, he could easily find them. Yeah, I definitely would encourage the fans to do that, for sure."

I nodded, making a note in my journal that I had the okay from my boss to write about the different envelopes in the newsletter. Meanwhile, I asked if it would be okay to mention the story article on Harry in the newsletter as well that would be published by Radio Weekly in July. Of course, the month started on Wednesday, but I figured if I mentioned he would be in the July issue a lot of people would be anticipating it. Not only would it be great for Radio Weekly, but it might create buzz within the community for people who maybe were not avid listeners of Harry's just yet.

"I think that would be a great idea. Can you do me a favor and include that Jack will be having a show on the tenth at The Ritz? That way people can purchase tickets early by calling the theater or they can show up the day of the show, but the tickets will be more expensive."

I quickly scribbled it in my notes. "Absolutely."

"Perfect. Also, I know that you're busy but I have new paperwork that will be dropping in for a new grant possibility."

"Did you ever hear anything about the other one?"

He shrugged. "They extended the deadline to past the fourth for whatever the reason may have been, so nothing back on that yet. However, this one the deadline is the tenth, so next week if you can make that work?"

"Not a problem," I nodded, quickly making another note in my journal before I glanced up at him. "I mean, if you have any paperwork on it right now, I would be more than happy to take a look at it today."

"I only have the basic sheet that they faxed over, they're going to send me the actual packet in the mail by Wednesday."

I nodded, taking the sheet from him that he had on his desk. Glancing over it quickly, I made sure to write down the brand name so that I could try and do some research on them later in the day at the library. I wanted to make sure that I had as much knowledge as possible so that I could appeal to them later when the rest of the paperwork actually came in on Wednesday.

"How did the interview with Harry go on Friday?" Mr. Watson asked. "Did you get everything from him that you may have needed?"

Even if I had been the one that wanted to talk about Harry in here, it was still difficult to think about him. I was worried about him, even if he had hurt my feelings yesterday. After all, he never missed work–never. This was so unlike him, and the idea that he wasn't here when he ran such a well-liked talk show was absolutely insane to me. Especially since I felt like the morning for some people might have been completely thrown off if he wasn't there to do his little talk show that so many people loved not only in this town but all over the country.

"It went fine. I think Marcus will love it, actually. Do you know where Harry is today, though? It seems so unlike him to not have made it in here."

"He wanted to take a personal day. I could tell he was upset about something this morning," Mr. Watson shrugged. "Very unlike the kid if you ask me. I don't think he's missed a day once in the three years that he's worked here."

He hadn't missed a single day the entire time that he worked here, but the day after our big fight he wasn't here? It seemed like incredibly crazy timing, but I also shouldn't have cared. He had been a complete piece of shit to me and that was none of my business what he did on his random personal day. I nodded with the words that Mr. Watson said, telling him that it did seem out of character so I hoped that he would be better. Mr. Watson asked if there was anything else that I needed to ask him about, but when I said I was all good, however, he seemed to have a final question.

"Miss Holmes, and you truly do not have to answer, I just don't want something around the office starting, but are you and Mr. Styles ..." Mr. Watson cleared his throat. "Are you two seeing each other?"

It was clear he looked just as awkward asking the question as I felt hearing the question. I knew that something was bound to be said. It wasn't necessarily obvious when Harry and I were in our offices, however, I knew there were times when he had hugged me in his studio for everyone to see–even if it was brief and about work. However, I wondered if rumors were already starting to spread for the question to even come out of his mouth.

"Oh, um..." I started to say, not even certain how to answer the question. "I mean, we hang out outside of work. I don't really know what is going on, if I am being completely honest with you."

Mr. Watson nodded. I could tell he wasn't sure what to make of my answer, but I also wasn't even sure what to say to him either. After all, Harry and I were in the middle of fighting, so this wasn't helping. I had no idea what to call us, and yet here I was, being asked if there was something going on between Harry and I and I had no idea. I didn't know how to answer. I mean, I had asked Harry for the interview if he was seeing anyone, and he had definitely made it sound like we were seeing one another, though, with the fight that took place yesterday I didn't know how I wanted to continue.

"Okay. Well, I know it is not any of my business in the slightest, but I just have to bring it up to HR if anything changes. I hope you understand. I like to run a very reputable radio station, and again it is no issue, I just don't want anyone else from the station thinking anything that they shouldn't."

"Right, of course," I nodded. "I'll try and ask him what is going on."

"No rush. It is your personal life, Miss Holmes, I wouldn't like to get in the middle of it by any means. Especially if Mr. Styles is involved. He can be pretty ... intimidating even to me at times over the past couple of years."

It was weird to imagine that Mr. Watson was at times intimidated by Harry, but I also knew that it had to be a pretty average thing. After all, Harry was intimidating to me when I had first met him, but he was especially intimidating as of yesterday. I could tell that he, at times, was not someone to mess with and it made sense. So, Mr. Watson not wanting to get involved seemed very understandable, but I could also understand him wanting to make sure that his station continued to stay reputable.

"Anyway, have a great day, Miss Holmes."

I nodded, thanking him before I stood up from the seat. He walked me to the door, pulling it open before holding it for me to exit. I said goodbye, thanking him again for answering all of my questions before I began heading back up to my office. It left me to work on several different things for the rest of the day.

I had to make sure that the newsletter for next week had a basic outline, and I needed to start my research on the company that the new grant would be through. It seemed weird to me that the other grant I had been working on was pushing the deadline back, but I wondered if something had happened that they needed the extra time. Sighing to myself, I sat down in my office chair, still wondering if Harry was okay. Even if I had been irritated with him, I was still worried. But, I also didn't want to go out of my way to call him. Especially since he had made me feel so poorly.