Hi there! My name is Kristi, also known as kristmcm on Wattpad, and this is my fifth *eek* Wattpad Block party! I can't thank KellyAnneBlount enough for having me as part of this awesome collection for another round!

I am probably best known for my One Direction fan fictions, such as the Afterlife series, The Girlfriend Experience and more. My latest story, Seeing Blind, is a Harry Styles AU, which is also currently up on Swoon Reads (in a revised non 1D version) as well as here on Wattpad. Those who have been reading this story so far have been asking for Harry's point of view on his first encounter with Sutton, so what better subject to write for my WBP post!?

I hope you enjoy this addition to the story, only found here in the Wattpad Block Party! And if you are enjoying Seeing Blind, be sure to pop over to Swoon Reads to rate and comment to help it have a chance at publication!

https://swoonreads.com/m/seeing-blind/

Thanks so much for reading, and for supporting all the writers taking part in the latest block party!

Lots of love! Krist

***

Stepping into the house, I groaned inwardly as I looked around. I had asked Niall to clean up a little bit before his friend arrived that afternoon, but it looked like even more of a mess had been made since I left. Dishes were scattered on the counter, with even more papers and random rubbish littering the dining room table. I sighed, already embarrassed for myself and the slobs I lived with. This poor girl was going to think she was living with cavemen by the way these three behaved. As if living with four guys wasn't going to be hard enough for her.

Kicking my shoes off, I immediately found Niall standing in the kitchen leaning on the counter.

"I thought I asked you to clean up a bit before you picked up your bird?"

"I did!" he argued, seeming genuinely affronted.

I glanced around poignantly, before raising an eyebrow at him. "Where?"

"I tidied my room," he said sheepishly after a moment's pause. And I picked up the socks from the living room."

"Wow. You're practically Martha fucking Stewart now, Horan," I scoffed, coming to lean on the counter across from him. Flanking me on the left was Liam, matching my position. He was practically beaming with the excitement of new prey.

Christ. I could almost hear his lewd mental dialogue in my own mind. The prospect of a new girl in our lives would be like Christmas came early for Liam, his manwhore tendencies always on high alert. Niall had warned us all not to fuck with his friend the moment he had hung up the phone with his mum a few weeks before, telling us she would be coming to live with us for the foreseeable future. We were all warned under penalty of castration not to touch her, look at her sideways, or 'subjected her to any sexual voodoo'. The last one was mainly said to Liam.

"So, she here yet?" I asked, giving the room a cursory glance and finding it empty apart from us.

"Yeah, I picked her up this afternoon," Niall said, rummaging around in the cupboard in search of a glass. "She's setting up in Zayn's old room."

Liam nudged me with his elbow. "She's not, mate. I call dibs."

"For fuck sake, Payne, I warned you. If you try any of your twisted sexual voodoo shit on her, your ass is on the street, you hear me!?" Niall ranted, shaking the glass in his hand at Liam with enough force I was surprised it didn't fly out and smack him in the face. Although, to be quite honest, I don't think Niall would have felt too bad if it had, considering the current topic and the way his face was turning red as he cursed.

I couldn't hold back my chuckle as I shook my head at him. A shit disturbing part of me considering urging Liam on for no other reason than to fuck with Niall, but I had no doubt I would have plenty of time to get him going over the next while. From the way he spoke of this girl, it was like she was the little sister he never had. They had grown up together back when he and his mum would take summer trips to America, and kept in touch when his prick dad walked out when Niall was around thirteen or so. I vaguely remembered him mentioning this girl, Sutton, once or twice when we first met in ninth year. Never did I expect the girl who end up in our lives.

Deciding to side with Niall this time, I smacked Liam across the back of the head.

"Don't fuck with her, Liam. We have to live with this bird, remember? Just try to be nice, and pretend to be normal for a change?"

Niall seemed pleased, while Liam muttered some shit about me being one to talk about being normal, tossing a profanity my direction.

The sound of a door opening down the hall interrupted our playful banter, Nialls eyes lifting from looks of daggers at Liam to warm and broad smiled over my shoulder. The mystery girl emerges, it seems.

Niall moved around the island to approach her just as I pushed off the counter to greet our newest flatmate.

"Sutton, this is Harry," he said as I turned, a warm smile on my face. If the poor girl had Liam as her first introduction to living with us, she was probably traumatized. I was going to have to do a little damage control and set her at ease that we were all hormonal perverts.

I moved to welcome her, to reach my hand towards her, when my eyes took her in and I stalled. I felt like I had been slapped across the face, my entire body running cold within seconds. I couldn't tell if my heart was racing so quickly it was indiscernible, or if it had stopped entirely, but the ache in my chest was painfully familiar. It was the pain I had known for years now, and had come to learn to live with. But never did I expect the cause to be staring back at me with its big blue eyes and flawless skin.

My smile faded, quickly being replaced by shock. This couldn't be happening. She couldn't be standing here in front of me, and yet, she was. She was there, looking at me, her lips still full and plump, her hair waving down her back. She was stunning, like she always had been, effortlessly taking my breath away just by being in the same room as me.

She was here. She was alive, warm and soft. She was everything.

Ana.

How was this fucking possible? What the actually fuck? Was this some kind of prank by these asshole pricks I lived with? Was this some way to get back at me for bitching about their messy habits or loud sex waking me up at all hours? I was chilled through, a ripple of fear sliding through me as I stared at my ghost, looking back at me in the flesh.

I inwardly shook my head at myself, trying to rein in my thoughts. No. She wasn't Ana. Ana was gone. The pain of that realization hit me like a truck, with the same agony as it had the night I found her on that road. No number of days, weeks, months or years could ever erase the anguish of that night, as though he seeped into my body and lived in my muscle memory. There was no escaping it. And just like nothing could ever make me forget the pain, nothing could ever erase how much I longed for her.

I had to fight the urge to rush across the space between us and grab the girl, cupping her face and crushing her lips with my own. To feel those lips again, to touch her skin. To be close to her and have her ignite everything in me that extinguished when she died.

But I couldn't. Because this girl wasn't her. She wasn't my Ana.

My Ana was dead.

I don't know how much time passed as we stared at each other, the myriad of emotions crossing through me, no doubt showing through my eyes as I gazed at her in confused wonder. She stared back at me, and as I pulled myself out of my memories, I could see the uncertainty and fear in her eyes.

It pulled at the tension in my abdomen, but wasn't enough to rid me of the fury I felt. Why was she here? How was this happening? What had I done to deserve this painful reminder of the biggest mistake of my life? Was she sent here to torment me? To make me remember that it was my fault she was gone? That it was all my fault.

I could feel Niall at my back, but didn't turn to face him.

"Haz?"

His voice brought me out of my torment, and I bit the inside of my cheek painfully to try and get my shit together. Fuck this. I cant stand here looking at this girl for another second.

"Nice to meet you," I muttered, storming passed her without another look. I gave her a wide birth, not wanting to get any closer to her than I had to. I could feel the eyes of everyone in the room on my back as I practically ran like a fucking child to my room, slamming the door behind me.

The moment I was alone and her spell on me was broken, all the breath in my body came out in a gust. I had been holding it that entire time, if the burning in my chest was any indication. Closing my eyes, I leaned back against my door, focusing on my breathing. It was something I had learned after....after Ana. It was the only thing I could control in my life anymore. The way I breathed. It sometimes helped the pain. Sometimes it did jack shit. But I tried it now, panic and despair rising in every part of me.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

I hadnt even gotten to the third inhale before a soft knock sounded at my door. I opened my eyes, my teeth grinding together. I already knew it would be Niall. Part of me felt bad for being so fucking rude to his friend. The poor girl did nothing wrong, and I probably scared the shit out of her with my crazy assed reaction. But I couldn't imagine going back out there and looking her in the eye again. They were Ana's eyes. Or, close enough to haunt me.

Another soft rap, and the turn of the doorknob, I moved off the door just as Niall stepped peaked his head inside. When he found me standing just over the threshold, and I didn't scream at him to get out or punch him in the face, he slipped inside and closed the door behind him.

We stared at each other without a word for several long moments. I knew he was waiting for me to explain. Just like I was waiting for him to figure it out on his own. He was my oldest friend here in Birm. We had been friends in upper years, through all the ups and downs. He had been the one who urged me to go after Ana, even though she was so far out of my league it was laughable. It was Niall who helped me plan our first date. And it was Niall who practically camped out in the spare room at my parents when she died, trying to help me through the worst time in my life.

He knew her. How could he not see how much Sutton looked like her? How could he not understand?

"What the fuck Harry?" he finally said when I still remained tight lipped. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

I swallowed, my eyes falling away to the floor between us. I shook my head, but it was more to myself than to him. I just couldn't understand how the fuck this was happening?

"Harry?" Niall repeated, a little louder this time. "Why did you treat her like that?"

Stepping back, I fell back onto my bed with a bounce, before leaning my elbows on my knees. It was only then, she I was on a solid surface and knew I wouldn't fall when my knees gave out; which I knew they would the moment I said her name, I said the only thing that mattered. The one word that would explain everything that had just happened in such a short amount of time. One word was all it would take, and he would understand.

Meeting his eyes, I felt the burning of tears at the back of my own. Pushing them back, I swallowed against the burning in my throat, and the lump her name formed there as I struggled to say it for the first time in years.

"Harry?" he repeated. "Why?"

I locked my eyes with his, and her name fell from my lips with an ease that brought a rip of pain through me.

"Ana."

★ ★ ★

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