She was normal.
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Henry Winter x Reader
summary: Henry winter becomes infactuated with a girl, a completely normal girl, and that is for some reason what gets him.
cw: mentions of drugs, men yearning
word count: 855
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She was normal, completely and utterly normal; she was in the midst of a law degree, she wore a turtleneck and bell-bottom jeans, she had glasses, and she listened to rock. Henry was one of the campus weirdos with his insistent need to speak in Latin and prose and pinch his nose at those he considers normal.Â
It was almost midnight, the library was still open, it was dark, and the warm lamps of desks in faraway corners pooled on tables and over open books. She was by the window, tapping a black pen on the table's wood, one hand on the back of her neck, her eyes glued to the small print in the comically large, heavy book. Henry was standing in an aisle; he kept coming back purely for the opportunity to gaze out of the corner of his eye at her. The light washed her in a golden flow, pulling every little shade in her hair, face, and eyes bright and glowing. Henry stared at the same verses by Plato for what seemed like hours. When he took the bet to look again, he got caught in her iris; she was looking right at him, and a well-known smirk pulled at her glossy lips. His heart jumped to his throat, and his pinkie twitched by the spine of the book he held so loosely it could have been blown out of his grasp.Â
She smiled, her teeth pearly in the golden light. He did nothing; he couldnât move a muscle. Some may say she couldâve been Medusa, but he wasnât stone because this is the most alive he has felt in years, his heart pumped blood to every limb and orifice of his body, his mouth ran dry, and his mind kept going and going until somehow it was barely legible in his own mind.Â
âHiâŚCan I help you?â Her voice cut through the commonly silent library despite the fact that her voice was barely above a whisper.Â
âUh⌠Bonj-. Hi,â his mind flip-flopped between French and English. He was a deer caught in headlights
âHi!â She whispered and sweetly smiled. Her eyes were squinted and her cheeks plump as she smiled.Â
He silently fumbled with the book in his hands, unceremoniously shoving it between books, disgracing the Dewey decimal system. She stood up out of his sight and walked over; it took a couple of strong-willed steps before she tapped his coat's shoulder. He flinched and whipped around, staring at her, shorter than him and looking up with a daring eye. She passed him a note, legal pad paper, pale yellow, lined.Â
âItâs my number, call it.â It was less so an offer and more so an order, flat out telling him what to do.Â
Henry opened his mouth, but before anything slipped out, she walked away, sat back down and continued scanning and tapping her pen. He dutifully walked to his car, sat in the driver's seat and silently drove home. He was shocked. Once he had entered his home, he slid down into his big old armchair. He pinched the bridge of his nose and systematically diagnosed every detail he knew of her. She went to parties, loud ones with coke and K, she drank, occasionally in excess, but mostly only to the tipping point, she liked spirits more than beers and wine, she had glasses, two sets, one small and oval and one big and square, decently dated yet beautifully classy. She liked dark colours on her lips, brownish pinks, deep reds, nothing lighter. She was normal. Nothing heavenly or other-worldly, she was an ordinary girl with a normal choice of education. She wasnât mundane, but she was nothing like the scholars Henry surrounded himself with in his Greek class; they were ethereal and above all that commonly beautiful, pale porcelain observed on high shelves of ego. She was real, tangible, she smelt of bitter pot coffee and ballpoint pen ink, when she smiled her whole face changed and wrinkled, she had colour in her cheeks and a radiance to her that made knowing how someone liked their tea something entirely romantic.Â
He palmed the small note; her handwriting was a fast-paced cursive, scrawled more so than written. He dialled up the number on his landline; it rang once, then twice. There was a click, and he hung up. His heart was in his chest, and his elbows on his knees as he stared at the wall across from him. What am I doing? He repeated to himself over and over, mantra-like in nature and foolishly hopeless, as he tapped his foot against the wooden floor and kept huffing out his nose like this one decision weighed the weight of the world on his shoulders alone. He dialled up once more, there was one ring and then a click, she picked up.Â
âI swear to god if this is some prank call, Iâll sue.â It was her, her voice was like a shot, it burned him.Â
âI thought that was your job,â Henry joked, but it came out more like a choke. An actual feesible smirk tugging at the corners of his lips and his heart in his ears.
She laughed.
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a/n: let me know if anyone wants more















