A/N: I'm so sorrryyyy about the long gap between updates. Life outside of wattpad kinda became A LOT and I didn't want to write anything when my heart and head weren't in it. I love this story and I know a lot of you guys do too so I wasn't going to publish something half assed. Thank you for all your support. Love you guys like crazy.

"You are always such a surprise. You sure that was your first time?" Harry comments out of the blue, breaking the silence that had fallen between us. Us both trying to catch our breath after being reunited. If I had known that he was coming back early I would have at least shaved my legs, or cleaned the house, his museum is cluttered with my junk.

"Yes I'm sure" I let out a giggle in response. I still can't quite believe I've done it, and that it actually went well. Boy how embarrassed would I have been if he had said that he didn't want me to do it.

"What made you decide you wanted to?" Harry asks, his chest rising and falling in steady waves now even with the weight of my head lying on top of it. My eye level allows me to closely examine one of birds inked on his skin.

In truth it had been a mildly drunk discussion with Heather. She was pretty wicked drunk while I was on the way there, and she became pretty inquisitive about my sex life. Granted she always had been interested in it even when there wasn't one. But now I had one and I was nearly drunk so I gave her answers against my now sober better judgement. When I told her I didn't know what he 'tasted like' she encouraged me that it's something that men reaaallly love. And ever since she said that it had been nagging at me; why hadn't he asked me to? Did he want me to? Or was he getting someone else to do it? I don't want to lose him just because I'm not sexually adventurous. So I forced myself into asking if I could. And I'm quite happy with the result; he seemed happy and really it wasn't the worst thing in the world.

But instead of telling him this, I shrug. "I don't know, you always look after me so..." I trail off, tracing my index finger along the wing of the bird and feeling it carry me off.

"Well, you do look after me. I hope you didn't feel pressured" he replies quietly. I'm sure he isn't a huge fan of me tickling his chest with my soft touch but he doesn't make me stop.

"No of course not, I didn't feel any pressure at all" I reply, bringing my gaze up to meet his. He's never pressured me when it comes to sex; I've more felt pressure from him in other ways. Go here, do this, dress like that, behave like this. But that's not happened for a while, well there was that whole 'forget school come to New York' thing.

"How come you came back early?" I ask him after a moment or two. He's only back like a day and a bit early, but still. I hope nothing went wrong while he was over there.

"My last meeting got cancelled and so I just figured I would come back home. You miss me?" Harry flashes a wide grin down at me as I slowly nod my head.

"Of course I did, it's been a long week" I turn my chin upwards to look up at him. His head is propped up on a pillow, hair messy and somewhat clinging to his forehead. His bright green eyes are staring down at me, sending a warm chill through my core. I have missed him, but I think it was good for us to have some distance, I have to have at least a little bit of independence from him or else I might eventually go mad.

"And did you miss me?" I ask with a soft smile as Harry lifts up his hand and ticks some of my hair behind my ear, playing with the ends of it with his fingers absentmindedly.

"Yeah I did. You should have been there" He replies with a smile.

"Anymore trips in the upcoming future that I should be a aware of?" I ask him. It would be great if I could go on some of them with him, and I probably could if any of them were around the Christmas break. Or would that be weird? Me asking to spend Christmas with him? He probably has a big planned Christmas thing at his mum's house with all of his family. While I go to visit my mum and eat a crappy Christmas dinner made by the staff and watch TV quiz shows for the night.

"None that I'm aware of, I'm sure some need to be planned though. How about you?" He asks.

"Oh yes you know me, big travel Plans" I half laugh. "I probably will visit my mum this weekend but aside from that, nothing planned" I reply, allowing my eyes to drift back down to his chest. My attention is drawn to a small cluster of dark chest hairs before he responds quietly.

"Can I come?" He asks gently. I know when I told him about my mum, he asked if he could meet her. But I guess I never really thought we would get to the point of them actually meeting. Not many people in my life have met my mum, just because then I have to explain our whole situation and I like to avoid confronting this particular issue as much as possible. Besides, I just assumed he said it as a nice sentiment and not a genuine request.

"Really? You want to?" I reply equally as softly, my gaze returning to his face once more. There's a look of soft determination dancing across his features.

"If you would be comfortable with it then I really would. I want her to know that you're in good hands" His words warm me from the inside out. And it's suddenly making me really nervous. What if she hates him? What if he hates her? What if he's scared that one day I'll be like her and he will run for the hills?

"Sure. Yeah yeah of course, it would be nice for you guys to meet" I say instead. Now I just have to figure out if I should tell my mum that he will be visiting with me or not. One of her doctors talked to me recently about her anxiety levels so maybe I'll give her a little warning so she isn't completely caught off guard.

"I really wish you were in New York this week, you would have had a lot of fun" Harry drifts us back to our previous conversation. He really does love that place.

"You really are a big New York Fan aren't you?" I say in response. The whole time that he was away he was telling me how much he loves it there, and how much I would love it there. Like he's trying to convince me of it.

"Oh absolutely; I'll probably move back there someday" The words cause my stomach to sink a little bit. He's making plans for his future, plans that probably don't include me. Then again, I don't know if I could ever leave the UK, I couldn't leave my mother any more than I already have, it would kill her.

"Must be a special place" I manage to say before we are interrupted by my most hated sound on the planet. Harry's cellphone is buzzing on the night stand beside him, illuminating the dimly lit room around us, breaking our serenity like it hadn't already been broken by his last statement.

"Sorry love, gotta take this" He presses a quick kiss to my forehead before he pulls himself out of bed and answers the phone in a hushed tone on his way out of the room. I watch as the boxer clad figure wanders down the hallways, phone tightly pressed against his ear.

"Welcome Home" I mumble more to myself as I rub my face with my hands, suddenly feeling exhausted.

.............................................................................

"I thought he wasn't going to be home for a few more days?" Heather mumbles after finishing a mouthful of her hamburger. I pick at my chicken salad from the organic cafe down the street from the University, now that I'm mildly wealthy I can afford to blow £12 on a salad.

"His last meeting got cancelled so he came back home early" I explain. We've managed to find a bit of time between classes to grab some lunch. We have a tutorial to get to in half an hour though, I don't feel at all ready for this next exam and neither does Heather. We should be discussing other things, and yet here we are.

"Bet it's nice to have him back" she smiles. "What did he say when you told him about the break in?" She asks as she picks up her soda.

"I haven't told him, and I'm not going to" I reply quickly, causing Heathers eyes to widen and a bit of soda to drip out of her mouth.

"Elena are you serious? Three men tried to fucking break into your apartment with a sledgehammer in hand and you don't think that that's something he would want to know?!" Heather reprimands me in a hushed and hurried tone.

"Yeah I'm sure he would want to know. But if I tell him he's just going to get mad I didn't tell him straight away and then he'll make me move" It sounds stupid when I say it out loud, but to me it's a valid reason for not telling him.

"Well you can't seriously feel safe there?" She hisses in response. I haven't been back since it happened so I don't truly know if I do feel safe there. It all seemed like nothing to be honest. The landlord called me at like 2am and told me that three men were in masks outside of my apartment trying to unlock my door and get in. Luckily some of my neighbours were arriving home from a night out and the men got spooked so they ran off before they could get in.

"Look I'm sure it's fine. I filed a police report, nothing was stolen, it's unlikely they're going to come back and trying it again" I shrug and force myself to eat some more despite having lost my appetite during this conversation. Heather leans forward on her elbows and sits in silence for a moment or two before she speaks again.

"Why are you still keeping him at arms length?" She asks curiously. Her question throws me. She gave me the advice to let him in, and I did, why doesn't she see that?

"I'm not. He knows me very well, almost better than you know me" I point out to her. I've known Heather for what seems like forever, but it feels like a different kind of closeness with Harry.

"And yet you told me that your place was broken into and not him" She responds. I suppress the urge to roll my eyes. If I was with Harry at the time I would have told him what had happened, I wouldn't have been given a choice really. But I got the call when I was staying with heather for the night after her sisters party. If I had known she was going to get all judgey then I probably wouldn't have said anything to her.

"Because he will just overreact and I know that you are normally a very rational person" I reply. Heather shakes her head while maintaining an almost uncomfortable level of eye contact.

"I'm not rational when it comes to this. Your place is now been proven to be dangerous. You need to tell your man and move your shit" Her tone is decisive, as though the plans have been made and the decision is final. But I've thought this through.

"Heather, I promise you I am okay. I don't need Harry to move me into a new apartment." I take a few more stabs at my salad before Heather pipes up again. I'm already in debt to him for so much, I don't need him to put me up in a new apartment that costs way more than I could ever afford. If just have to move when we break up anyway.

"Well, what if he asked you to move in with him?" She has a coy little smile on her face. I can't help but scoff and laugh a little.

"Yeah right. He loves his little bachelor pad, there's no way he's going to want me to move in?" I have to admit, I did like living at his place while he was away, and I enjoy staying the night there while he's home. But it's definitely not going to be a permanent arrangement.

"And what makes you so sure of that?" heather replies quickly.

"Because it's quite possible that we won't last heather. I mean we've only been together for five months, and that's including the time that we were only together because we were contractually forced to be. He'll probably drop me in a few months for some Victoria Secret Model or some New York bitch" I can't keep the grumbling out of my voice.

"Woah, where did all of that come from?" Heather sits back in her seat, clearly caught off guard by my abrasiveness. "I thought you guys were good?"

"We are. At least I think we are. I don't know" I reply, suddenly feeling exhausted by my situation.

"Well what happened?" She isn't letting it go, she presses forward more.

"Nothing happened. I'm just...I'm being careful. You know me" I sigh. It's always been my default setting, protecting myself and my feelings is what I feel I do best. If you never let anyone in, then people can't hurt you or let you down or leave. Problem now is that Harry is already in, he could let me down, and he may leave.

Heather turns her head on it's side and gives me a slight sympathetic smiles. "It wouldn't kill you to maybe be a little bit emotionally vulnerable you know"

"Well, emotionally vulnerability isn't really my strong suit" I reply quickly. It really isn't. It's probably one of my weaker qualities. But I'm trying.

"I'm aware. But you'll be stuck in romantic limbo for the rest of your life if you don't get at least a little bit better at it" Heather makes a good point before she takes a massiver bite of her burger. I didn't honestly mean to start a big heart to heart in this cafe on a brief break between classes. I know this is one of those 'we have hours let's crack open a bottle of wine and let it all out' but sometimes the strings just snap inside my head at random times and I need to deal with them.

"It's just... I can't lose myself in this whole thing, and sometimes I feel like I am. Somedays I feel like I loose grip on who I am, and some days I don't know who I am altogether. And in between all of those days there are the good ones, the days where I'm completely wrapped up in his world but I love being there. It's all just a little bit too intense sometimes"

"I know babes, but I think you've maybe dealt with worse than this" Heathers smile warms up her face, and makes me feel slightly lighter. She's right, I've had a lot of shittier circumstances that I've had to deal with than this one. My little inner conflicts about being with a man who makes me truly happy a lot of the time is nothing compared to what's happened in the past.

"Exactly" I shrug with a slight grin. "Why can't the universe just be nice to me. Give me a normal relationship for once?" I half joke. Heather lets out a small laugh.

"If it wasn't hard than it wouldn't be worth it. You have to start talking to him about this sort of thing, and in my professional opinion I think you should start with the break in" Heather flicks her hair over one shoulder as she speaks.

"Oh, and since when were you a licensed therapist?" I enquire, leaning over my practically empty plate of food. Only a few sad leaves of lettuce drowned in dressing remain.

"Since you decided to come to me with all of your problems. I do really need to start charging you. But before I start my therapist office, we need to get to this bloody tutorial" I glance down at my watch as she speaks before I too leap out of my seat and start to pull my coat on. We will have to make a run for it if we don't want to be late.

A/N: hey guys! Thanks for reading. It's a bit of a short one to get me back into it but there will be more to come soon I promise. Love ya all xxx