Into You Series: The Complete Collection

22. Harry

CHAPTER 22

HARRY

S aria and I drove back to the auto shop and watched a movie like we always do. And then we curled up on the couch and fell asleep together.

Each exhalation beside me was a small breath of life into the air, a gentle breeze against my chest that should have cooled me down but only heated me from the inside out.

I can’t help but run my fingers through her hair, feeling every smooth strand of it. I’d never been this close to it for this long. Her roots are beginning to show, growing out so that her silver hair fades to a dark brown. I like the look.

Her plump pink lips, which seemed to be less relaxed the first time we slept together, now seem so tuckered out and gentle in their restfulness. I touch the bottom one with my thumb, stroking down to her chin and along her jawline.

I wish I could be as at peace as she looks, but that just isn’t in the cards. Because I know something she doesn’t. I know I am helplessly, hopelessly, deliriously in love with Saria, and I have no idea what to do about it.

The next day I wake up cooler than I expected. I blindly feel next to me for a body, but my arm doesn’t find purchase on anyone. I open my eyes and see that Saria isn’t lying beside me. My gut twists and I haphazardly shift around on the couch, reaching to the side table for my phone where, sitting next to it, I find a folded paper towel with Saria’s loopy handwriting and a small smiley face.

Hi Handsome. Had to go feed the bird. I’ll pick up Frankie tonight!

xo, Saria

She’s getting her van tonight.

I run a hand over my face and look around the apartment. It feels so empty without her already. She never lived here; we didn’t function like that. But I’m accustomed to her presence, to the life she brings to this apartment.

Without my two girls, this place feels empty.

I get off the couch, throwing the blanket over the back of it before hopping in the shower, pulling on jeans and a t-shirt then descending the steps into the shop to work. But, it feels like one minute I’m under the car’s hood and the next there’s a knocking at the side door. When I look at the clock on the wall, two hours have passed, and I hadn’t even realized it.

Through the window, I see Grant and Nia. Nia has her arms crossed, trying to peek in through the window, and Grant’s fist is poised to start pounding. And, just barely, I make out the tiny waving palm of my girl.

I blacked out that window as best I could when we decided to transform the shop into a dual-purpose home-work setup, so they can’t see me on the other side of the window as I slowly shake my head with a smile.

I walk over, wiping my hands on my jeans, and unlock the door. Cara comes bounding in, arms wrapping around my leg instantly. My heart leaps into my throat at the feeling as I pick her up in my arms and rest her on my side.

“How’d it go?” I ask.

“Uncle Grant cried at Toy Story ,” she says, eliciting a snort from Nia.

“You promised you wouldn’t tell,” Grant groans.

“Big old softie, isn’t he?” I say.

Cara nods feverishly and giggles as I kiss her forehead and place her down.

Grant steps into the shop, digging his hands deeper into his jacket pockets. I can feel the bite of the outside before shutting the door behind Nia. It’s getting chillier with each day. I can’t help but wonder how Saria’s van will fare.

It doesn’t help that it looks overcast.

“Storm is rolling in,” Nia says, shivering in her peacoat.

“It’s warmer up in the apartment,” I say, nodding toward the stairs. Cara knows the drill already and is five steps up before Nia gets the hint and ascends as well.

“You have cereal, Harry?” she calls down to me.

“Of course,” I say. “I have a six-year-old. What type of dad would I be if I didn’t have cereal?”

“Ooh, do you have that popping kind that does the whole…y’know, popping thing?” Grant asks.

“Yeah, we got that one,” I say. Once Nia and Cara are out of earshot, I lean forward. “Did you really cry at Toy Story ?”

“Yes,” he says with a scoff. “Dude just loved his toys, man.”

I clap him on the back and shake my head. “Damn love, huh?”

We eat breakfast together, talking about their sleepover. Nia dropped by Grant’s apartment after Ian went out of town to deal with a case, which is surprising given how Nia and Grant require a buffer between them to spend time together. They would never hang out without myself or Ian in the mix to smooth the edges. It’s always been like that with those two. But then again, they’re the opposites in our family. Nia, straitlaced and strong. Grant, a tornado always rearing up to cause the next disaster. He’s been calm for the past year, but a lifetime of mistakes is something Nia doesn’t forgive as easily as I can.

So why are they hanging out?

Once Cara is full of cereal and settled into the couch watching her cartoons, it’s just me, Nia, and Grant at the table with our coffees and an eerie silence as I sip mine and look from Nia to Grant.

“Okay, what’s going on?” I ask.

“What do you mean?” Nia says.

“You two don’t just hang out together.”

They exchange a look with Grant nodding smugly.

“I told her you love Saria,” he says.

“What!” I say, my voice lowering to a near hiss as I peek over to where Cara sits on the couch. She’s thankfully too enraptured by her show to have noticed.

“Oh my god, you do ,” Nia says breathlessly, her jaw slowly dropping.

“Maybe,” I say. You never really know if you love someone until the words leave your mouth, and that hasn’t happened yet. I don’t want to know how it feels. “She’s leaving soon so it doesn’t matter.”

“She’s leaving soon? Has she put in her two weeks’ notice?” Nia asks. I can feel the panic rise in her tone.

“Hey, no HR pants in this conversation,” Grant says.

“Right, sorry,” Nia says, nodding. “I have to remember she’s not an employee right now. We’re talking about her as your girlfriend.”

I groan. “About that…she’s not my girlfriend.”

Nia narrows her eyes. “But you said?—”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know what she is, exactly,” I admit.

It’s quiet at our small table that feels even smaller with the weight of that statement. Hell, I don’t know what she is. All I know is I’m pretty sure I’m in love with a girl I can’t keep in a relationship I can’t even begin to define.

“You guys sleep together, don’t you?” Grant asks, breaking the silence.

“You sleep together ?” Nia says, her voice rising higher than our regulated whispers have been.

I flatten my hand, lowering it to signal a lower voice as well.

“Yes. We were…doing things.” I hate talking about sex around Nia. My sister is my best friend and confidante, but we always avoid the whole sex aspect of life. One year ago, when she came back from Grace and Cameron’s wedding hand in hand with Ian, I wasn’t exactly surprised, but it was Grant who said, “Hey, you think they had beach sex?” I promptly punched him in the stomach and we never mentioned it again.

“So, you’re sleeping with her,” Grant continues. “I’d say that’s one point in the relationship column.”

“You have a running list?” Nia asks.

“I do now.”

Nia clears her throat. “Well, Saria…is…well, she’s a bit young for you, isn’t she, Harry?”

“Too late to be judging on that,” Grant says, shifting in his chair with a snide grin. He takes a long, exaggerated sip from his coffee mug. “His penis has been inside her.” Both Nia and I shush him simultaneously as he shrugs. “Just sayin’.”

Nia scrunches up her nose, and I get the feeling she’s debating whether or not to slap his mug right out of his hand.

I open my mouth to intervene before she can follow through. “So, back to the point…you went over to his house to gossip?”

“I went over to his house to get more information ,” Nia says. I don’t really see the difference, but I don’t push the point. “You haven’t had a girlfriend in…years. Since even before Riley.”

I fiddle with the top of my coffee mug, stroking around the rim with my thumb. “Well, I technically don’t now either.”

“You definitely won’t in a week or two when she leaves.”

“God, Grant, do you have to be so callous?”

“Hey, just seconds ago you were saying how she was too young.”

“Yeah, but he clearly loves her so I’m not going to?—”

“Children,” I say, tilting my head.

Their mouths slam shut before they both sip their coffee. Though Grant doesn’t seem the least bit embarrassed about being chastised, Nia’s face is bright red.

“She should ask for a personal short-term leave,” Nia says. “Our policy is pretty generous.”

“I don’t think she wants to be a receptionist anymore,” I say with a sigh.

“It’s still the responsible thing to do,” Nia continues. “Put in the leave, come back after a month or so, and then she can decide where she wants to be.”

I almost say how she doesn’t want to decide. Saria has made up her mind. It’s her dumb ex who motivates her toward her decision, and he’s too entwined in her life for her to consider anything different. Noah’s roots are simply too deep for me to dig out in the course of three months. Saria thinks she’s going after freedom, but she’s just running away from her problems. She’s running away from me and Cara.

“She just wants to leave,” I say, throwing a hand in the air, exasperated by the endless circles my brain is cycling through. “That’s all she talks about. That’s all she wants.”

“What do you want?” Nia asks.

I expect a snarky comment from Grant to follow, but all I hear is the distant sound of my daughter’s television show and the silent rumble of the coffee maker behind me.

I know what I want.

I want Saria.