His mouth slightly parted, eyes drifting to something sad with her words, if not vacant. He was without a doubt still caught in some brief distraction, trying to notice if there was anything different about her. Anything. He remembered everything. His eyes dropped to the small freckle just below her neck, on the right side, inches from the strap of her dress, from the ends of her blonde hair, and his lips moved as if to speak. To apologize again, maybe— to break and explain everything he thought she wanted to hear but had no way of confirming. ‘Joking’. His earthy eyes moved back to her brown. They didn’t have enough fingers between the both of them to count how many times he’d gotten utterly lost in the sheer warmth of those eyes. Like standing at the face of a labyrinth. Heavenly. Now as he looked he could admit to himself there was something that felt as though it were blocking him. Detached. That may be a better word, and he settled on it, an empty feeling though his smile widened. He let out a slight, sputtering laugh as he looked down at the table, trying to recoup, his dimple briefly in view as he shook his head, “That is the worst part about the seasons changing.” He agreed, looking up at her, finding her smile and her drifting question.
How was he? How. By what means was he? This felt like a complicated question, even though he knew it shouldn’t be. If she’d asked how he’d been that would be a different answer. But she meant present tense. Sitting across from her, and so he scanned her eyes before giving her a small smile, “I’m good,” He told her, his eyes leaving her, but lingering, down between her collars, adjacent to her suprasternal notch were a few more of her moles and freckles, clustered, like a constellation. She was the same, still beautiful— an irrefutable fact, and even more so in that dress. He still felt as he’d always felt looking at her: undeserving. Harry had a hyper awareness of her, and perhaps that was just a post-side effect of mild shock, but here he sat subtly absorbing her, trying to regather his thoughts, “I didn’t mean to give you the impression that I didn’t ever want to see you again.” He told her, finding her irises again, “That’s not what I intended.” He spoke with a steady voice, a sure honesty, and he did mean it. He was sorry she felt that way about him. He was sorry for anyone else who’d left her and never bothered to show back up. He was sorry. He became aware in their silence of the clinking of glasses and machinery, and then in trying to thwart it he attempted to relieve any tension that had arisen, slightly smiling, “… How are you though? Besides the allergies, of course.”
henry vividly remembered the party she was forced to attend with her intoxicated aunt, a memory from her teenage years that stuck with her forever. her aunt was telling the crowd, slurring most of the time, that in old films, a thick layer of vaseline would be spread on the lenses to soften and blur the ageing actresses’ wrinkles. it seems like you were born with vaseline lens instead of eyes, her aunt jokingly said, and a part of her liked it, a compliment of sorts, she thought, until now. hands resting on her lap were absent-mindedly fidgeting with the lace detailing of her dress, wondering when exactly it was removed for their featurette. she didn’t dare to look him in the eye no longer than five seconds, desperately trying to cling onto the memory of the warmth in his hazels. more than that, she was scared of not being able to forget the freckle patterns of his nose, forever haunted by his ghost. not like heathcliff wanting to be haunted by catherine, no, she didn’t wish it, knowing how he really felt about her; not love, never love, an infatuation at best. so she struggled to keep the eye contact, his eyes lacked the spark that set wild fires in her chest, this, this didn’t do justice to the man she loved. or perhaps she thought she loved him, would that make things easier? not really. “ah, yeah..definitely.” henry didn’t have the heart to tell him she no longer liked fall, that she had never been a big fan of change. everything was flowing into melancholy. a smile graced her face, tongue flicking out over dry lips “you remind me of autumn, have i told you that before? if not, the sea. i am more of a summer girl, i think.”
it felt like someone abruptly changed the lens mid-film, vision still blurry and dizzy, but not like the lighthearted, dream-like kind it once was around him. “good, good,” she repeated, unsure if it was fair to expect more. the magic was gone and she was crawling back to her shell, nervously tapping her fingers over the exposed skin above her knees, biting the inside of her cheek. brows knitted together, she nodded, somehow not feeling the relief effect he seemed to think his words possessed. on the contrary, it felt as if he was pitying her and a sudden urge to disappear into thin air overtook her senses. “i don’t know, i really don’t. i don’t know anything when it comes to you, harry.” air thickened and regret bolted through her body with her decision to open up, feeling herself drifting towards a dangerous path, where she would annoy him again. “healing, i guess? i.. i don’t want to lie, it’s been difficult, but you’re not the first one to, you know, walk away. certainly won’t be the last either.. but i’m a tough cookie,” awkwardness etched into every syllable, accompanied by a genuine laugh leaving her lips “i just need to activate the terminator mode or whatever.” funny how she could still lose and find herself over and over again in his presence like nothing had happened between them. a grin tugged her lips, two dimples cratering her round cheeks were finally in the spotlight, she shrugged. “i am extremely nervous, if you can’t tell. i just don’t know how to be around you if i am not your henry, or something like that... you get me, right? i am sorry.”
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