Sort of a christmas fic, but mostly just a mess.
Harry’s imagined this moment hundreds of times. This one phone call. Sometimes he’d be in line in the supermarket, surrounded by people who were impatiently tapping their foot and checking their phones while waiting for their turn. Other times he’d be at work, in a meeting, and he’d have to excuse himself to take the call. Or maybe he’d discover a missed call after going to the gym.
It doesn’t go anything like he’d imagined though. No, this is how it goes, on the day before Christmas, four o’clock in the afternoon, the kitchen filled with groceries and Niall hundreds of miles away.
He drags four bags filled with groceries up the stairs, cheeks red with the cold, and when he’s making room in the refrigerator he realizes that he’s forgotten to get figs. He’s been planning this dinner since November, wants to make sure that everything is perfect. He always wants it to be, and he never really succeeds. There’s always something that goes wrong, and still he’s made some of his favourite memories during these Christmas dinners.
Everything had been going according to plan this time, and now he has to go back to the overcrowded supermarket, just to get some figs. Overcome by a heavy feeling of fatigue, he leans against the counter. The supermarket is closing in half an hour, he can’t make the recipe without figs and he doesn’t feel like coming up with another dish.
Harry just stands there for a while, staring at the now molten chunks of snow on the bags and on the floor that form a trail to the door, and he can’t find it in himself to get up and leave.
Why do the days leading up to Christmas have to be so hectic? Aren’t these days supposed to be a period of peace, of looking back and looking forward? Several times he’s been about to just do everything entirely different this year, just rent a cottage somewhere and hide away with Niall – just be alone for once.
Christmas is always a marker in time for Harry, the time when he thinks about the previous year and the year before, the things that have been successful, the things that haven’t been, things he hopes for the year that will follow.
Maybe next year this time, that’s what he always wants to believe. He always wants to believe that it’s possible, knowing that he’d been hoping that last year too, and the Christmas before that too.
He thinks of how time flies by, the time that’s also a factor in every single way, and he knows that the possibility that they’ll still be hoping next year is getting more and more real. Hope and fear have started to resemble one another, and he can no longer hope without feeling fear, one getting smaller and the other bigger.
His thoughts are interrupted by his phone, then, and he doesn’t want to get it at first. It’s probably his mom who wants to know if everything is going alright. He changes his mind, though, and he scrambles to get it before it stops ringing. He doesn’t recognize the number.
"Harry Styles," he says, unconsciously pulling his scarf a bit tighter around his neck. “Yes, I am.”
He walks over to the window and stares at the neighbour who’s been sweeping the sidewalk all afternoon. “I’m sitting down,” he says, moving to sit down on the couch, his hand on the fabric of the checkered pillow. "Niall is at work, I’m alone."
He looks around the living room, at Niall’s guitars, at the books spread around the room, but he doesn’t really see any of it. Before he really understands what’s being said, something swells up in his chest, something that’s immediately bigger than he can contain. His body has understood before he himself has.
The phone call doesn’t last very long. Not long enough. He wants to call back, wants to hear it again, because one time is not enough to believe that he’s really heard it right, that it‘s really true. He gets up and moves to stand at the window, scratches at a stain on the glass, walks to the kitchen and moves a few groceries around on the countertop before sitting down at the kitchen table.
He checks his watch, tries to remember if Niall told him what time he’d start the drive home. He’s probably on his way from London now.
“Can you call me?” he starts typing and erases it. Niall would be scared or worried and when he would call, Harry wouldn’t be able to tell him anyway. It’s so strange, the fact that Harry knows and that Niall doesn’t suspect a thing.
He just sits at the kitchen table for a while, looking around the apartment they’ve been living in for six years now. Oak floor, floor to ceiling windows, a piano against the wall. It’s all so familiar, but everything seems to have a different glow now, an extra meaning of which he can’t see the full extent.
Everything is going to be different. Next year he will look back on this Christmas and know exactly where he was when they called. Everything already is different.
Six o’clock comes, and Niall isn’t home yet. “I’ll be home in time for dinner,” he’d said, but Harry knows that had been a promise that consisted mainly of wishful thinking.
He checks his watch again, just to see that only eight minutes have passed since the last time he checked. Grateful that he has enough to do, he starts with the preparations for dinner.
By seven o'clock dinner’s ready, and after reading the paper and watching the news, he hears the key in the front door lock at nine past eight. When Niall steps into the living room, the glow of candlelight is reflected in his tired eyes, and to Harry he’s never looked more beautiful. Niall silently throws his coat over an armchair, something Harry normally hates. He’s hardly bothered now, though.
He walks over to Niall and lets himself be enveloped in a hug, a hug that feels like a little touch of heaven. He leans in so his foreheads rests against Niall’s and kisses Niall's warms lips.
"What a day," Niall sighs. 'I'm exhausted. Glad I'm home. How was your day?'
Harry shrugs, just points at the table. “Are you hungry?”
Niall pulls a beer from the fridge, uncaps it, turns off his phone and sits down at the table. Then he sees the extra plate on the table. “Are we expecting someone?”
Harry just nods. Niall puts his beer bottle down his beer bottle, a frown forming between his eyes. “Who is it?”
The fact that Niall doesn’t know a thing, the news that’s now only Harry’s, the news he’s about to share, it’s almost too much. He sits down on Niall’s lap, puts his arms around him and kisses him, but Niall resists.
"What's going on?" He’s getting nervous, worrying his lip between his teeth.
Although the message on the phone had been short and simple and Harry would never forget it, it was impossible to repeat the words just like that.
Niall looked at him warily, a look in his eyes where fear and hope are united.
“We have a son,” Harry blurts out. Something changes in Niall’s eyes then, and it’s a look Harry’s never seen before. He presses his face against Niall’s sweater, feels Niall’s hands framing his face, his thumb brushing gentle circles on his cheeks.
Sharing the news has changed everything again, has made it even bigger. They sit like that for a long time before Harry suddenly gets up. “They’ve sent a picture,” he says, pulling his phone out of his pocket.
He thumbs through his emails until he’s found the picture. Finally a picture of a little boy appears on the screen. Harry doesn’t know how this little guy they didn’t know anything about just a few hours ago can feel like theirs already, but he does, and even though they won’t be able to hold him for a long time, they can’t let go of him anymore.
