Harry knocks promptly on the door three times before stepping back and waiting. He rocks awkwardly back and forth on his heels, ultimately looking as if he’s going to fall every time he leans back because he has to hold his hands out in front of him for balance. Once he realizes that he is going to potentially hurt himself, he stops and attempts to shove his hands into his skinny jean pockets. Only his thumbs end up fitting.

The clicking sound of lock brings Harry’s attention back to the door and he takes a tiny step forward as the door opens. Only, he doesn’t smile when the door opens, as he had assumed he would. Instead, he scrunches his eyebrows together in confusion, reciprocating the look on the other male’s face.

“Um… You’re Harry Styles,” the male in the door frame says, looking around as if he is expecting a hidden camera crew or his brother to pop out at any second and say, “Gotcha” or something along those lines.

“Yes, yes I am,” Harry says, curving one side of his mouth up in a half-smile, half confused sort of way.

“Why are you… here, then? I mean, it’s cool that you are – I’m a huge fan – but why are you at my house?” The other male once again does a quick sweep of his front yard, failing to see anything suspicious.

Harry scratches the back of his neck. “Right… I’m here to see Darren? She told me she would be here… I guess that makes you her brother – or, one of them at least.”

Jack, the brother standing at the door, becomes a tad more confused than Harry. For one, he’s wondering why Harry Styles is looking for his sister who assumedly made plans with him, because last he checked, Darren doesn’t like One Direction. Also, Jack is checking his pulse to see if he’s still breathing and wondering why he hasn’t freaked out yet.

He tries to recall his sister ever mentioning being tight with Harry freaking Styles. ‘Darren… and Harry Styles… Harry Styles… and my sister… Darren… Har – Harry!’ A light bulb goes off in Jack’s head.

“Oh… so you’re Harry!” Jack curves his lips into an o shape to exaggerate his new discovery of putting two and two together. “I mean, you are Harry, but you’re like, that Harry… As in the guy Darren messaged over kik, not as in you… have a lot of hair.”

Harry finally laughs, breaking the awkward tension that everyone was feeling. “Yes, that would be me.”

Jack laughs as well. “Well, Darren should be on her way back with Finn from her getting her learner’s permit, but you’re welcome to wait inside until she returns. I was just about to make lunch, if you want to join me. I make a pretty mean sandwich.”

Harry lets out a short ha. “Doubt it.”

Jack raises an eyebrow. “Are you doubting my sandwich making skills? Like you could do any better.”

Harry also raises a brow. “Is that a challenge?”

“I believe it is.”

“To the kitchen, then.”

~

Darren bounces up and down ecstatically, clutching the copied sheet of paper tightly in her hands, but not tight enough to crinkle it. When Finn pulls into driveway, Darren is already unbuckled and climbing out of the slow-moving vehicle before the garage door even opens. Of course Finn yells at her for not knowing car safety, but she ignores him, leaving him laughing at the irony of the situation.

She opens the door in the garage that connects to the kitchen. When she sees the kitchen, she stops in her tracks, her smile wiping off of her face. Deli meat containers lie still on the center kitchen island, but pieces of shredded lettuce are crushed on the tiled floor. What appears to be paprika seasoning is sprinkled in every spot of open space. A white substance that Darren only hopes is mayo is smeared on a few of the kitchen cabinets. Though it doesn’t seem like much, the kitchen is an overall disaster.

Darren barely registers the opening and closing of the door behind her before a manly gasp is heard. Finn steps around Darren to properly look at the mess in front of them, and by the look on his face, it definitely isn’t pretty.

Two men at the kitchen counter sit at bar stools, not noticing the Darren or Finn and vice versa. Their eyes are closed, and they chew on one another’s “masterpieces” with great intensity and concentration.

“This is delicious.” Harry’s words are barely made out due to his full mouth, but he’s still understandable.

“Yours is too. What is that seasoning though? Cayenne?” Jack chews on the sandwich more. “No, that’s definitely paprika.” Harry proceeds to tell him that paprika is correct though he didn’t mean to actually put the spice on the sandwich.

Finn’s eyes are narrowed on his look alike. “Jack…”

Jack glances up at Finn. “Uh-oh…”

When Darren finally registers the other everyone’s voices, she perks her head up again, smiling widely. “Harry!” she shouts and begins to make her way out of the kitchen, stepping carefully over lettuce leaves and tomato slices, nearly panicking when she almost falls into a head on collision with the cabinet where a stray cut of deli turkey is somehow sticking. Luckily, she catches herself just inches from the meat.

Harry also perks up when he notices her. He sets the sandwich down and wipes his hands on his jeans before standing up to meet her in the archway that separates the kitchen and the living room where the bar stools sit. When she finally gets to him, she throws her arms around him, catching him by surprise because she’s never hugged him before. She has made it clear from the start that she doesn’t do hugs unless the person is either (a) family, (b) a long time friend, or (c) a “huggable” person – by her made up standards of course. Either way, he wraps his arms back around her to hug back.

Finn, who was about to yell at Jack, stops when he sees the sight. His jaw drops, not only because Harry Styles is in his house, but also because his sister is actually hugging someone – who also happens to be Harry Styles. Jack follows Finn’s eyes and drops his jaw, too. It certainly isn’t everyday Darren hugs people she hasn’t known for too long. The norm for finally hugging someone is about a year, maybe more, but never less.

She pulls back from Harry’s arms, not making any comments on the hug. “When did you get here and what the hell did you guys do to the kitchen?”

Harry laughs. “About an hour ago and your brother thought he could make a better sandwich than me, so of course we made sandwiches to settle the debate.”

Darren glances down to the sandwiches on the countertop where Jack is still sitting and walks over to examine them. She picks up the first one, Jack’s sandwich that Harry had been eating from and takes a bite out of it. She shrugs and passes the sandwich to Finn, because they both had been starving after being out, and picks up Harry’s sandwich that Jack had been eating. She takes a bite of that one and sets it down. When she finishes swallowing she says, “This one needs less paprika, or none at all – who the hell puts paprika on a sandwich? And the other one needs more mayo, or mustard… or anything to make it less dry.”

“But which one is better?” Jack asks.

Darren shrugs. “None can compare to my sandwich.”

Finn chokes on his bite of Jack’s sandwich when he starts to laugh. “You’re not allowed in the kitchen. When have you ever made a sandwich?”

“Why aren’t you allowed in the kitchen?” Harry asks her.

Ignoring Harry, Darren smiles. “I haven’t.”

“Then, you don’t have a sandwich.”

“Exactly.”

“What?”

“Anyway… Guess what!” she announces to everyone, not including Finn who was with her when she received her news to tell. She starts to jump up and down again in excitement.

“Australian kangaroos are congregating to the UK,” Jack immediately guesses, crossing his fingers in a childlike way.

Darren stops jumping and rolls her eyes. “No, and I’m pretty sure you mean migrate.”

“Santa Clause gave all the elves the year off and no one will be receiving presents,” Harry tries, also pressing his luck to be right.

“As great as that sounds, no,” Darren frowns. She holds up the piece of paper in her hand. “I got my learner’s permit!” Jack jumps up and starts cheering. Harry cheers with him, though he doesn’t quite understand how incredibly significant this is for Darren who had already taken the test twice before and failed.

“What was your score?” Jack asks.

“I got a thirty-nine out of forty-six on the test, and I only had to get thirty-eight to pass. Finn is going to start giving me lessons on Friday, so we’ll see how it goes from there.”

“Yup, not looking forward to it,” Finn says, looking down then up at Darren with an innocent smile plastered onto his face. Darren smiles back with a mischievous glint in her eyes, knowing that the lessons will be chaos.

“So, do you want to get going then?” Harry asks. He looks at his watch to check the time, but he’s not too concerned that they’ll be missing anything because they aren’t.

Darren nods. “Yeah, let’s go.”

Jack stops her. “Where are you guys going?”

“There’s an arts and crafts show going on in the park, but we’ll probably just hang out by the lake for the most part.” Jack nods at Darren’s answer and Harry tells him that it was nice meeting him as Darren runs to grab her penny board. When she returns, she and Harry head out the front door. Together, they start to head to the park across the street with Darren on her board and Harry pulling her along by hand. Darren laughs at him for pulling her, telling him that she can penny board by herself, and quite well at that. He just shakes his head and insists on pulling her along with him.

~

The sky is just barely beginning to turn a warm shade of light pink on the horizon line and people from the arts and crafts fair are slowly starting to disperse, but the two keep strolling along. Harry walks backwards, puling Darren along the sidewalk that is closest to the lake that sits close to the center of the park. He smiles happily at Darren as she continues her rant on girls who claim to like Star Wars when in reality they only like Star Wars for their cool clothing and other merchandise.

“I’m serious though. Pretty much every girl who wears Star Wars merch has never even seen the movies! It’s so aggravating. Like, I went up to this one girl one time and she was wearing an amazing vintage tee with the characters in a band, so Leia singing lead, Han Solo on bass, C-3PO and R2-D2 on keyboard, Luke and Darth Vader on guitar, and don’t even get me fucking started with Chewbacca on the fucking drums!”

Harry laughs, “Yeah, I think I’ve seen that shirt before. I think one of the lads might have it.”

“Right, so anyway. I walk up to the girl and said, ‘Hey, I like your shirt,’ so she said thanks. Then, me being me, I asked her which movie was her favorite and she was all, ‘Oh, I don’t know, I’ve never seen them before.’ And she giggles as if she made a joke or some shit and walked away. I was pissed off.”

“I just don’t get why it’s such a big deal. I mean, it’s a cool shirt. You don’t have to like a movie to wear a shirt, so why couldn’t she wear it?”

Darren groans and takes a hand from his to facepalm for emphasis. She covers her eyes and shakes her head in disappointment. When she looks back up at him, it literally kills her inside. How can he not understand what she is trying to say? Harry just gives her a crooked half smile, like he’s unsure if she is going to kill him or not.

Darren finally sighs. “Okay, say you like a band – like you really like this band, right?” Harry nods. “And you see someone wearing their shirt.” He nods again in her pause. “But that person doesn’t like that band and has only ever heard one song that everyone knows. You would be mad, wouldn’t you?”

Harry nods with his head hanging low because of her feat. “Yeah, I see what you mean now.” Darren smiles in her victory, but it falters when her board jumps forward as it travels over a bump. Her freehand instantly latches onto Harry’s shoulder and he stops walking, grabbing onto Darren’s waist to steady her. “I’ve got you,” he smiles.

Darren laughs at herself, “I almost fell.”

“But you didn’t,” Harry points out.

She looks into his eyes and huffs. “Yeah, you caught me.”

Harry laughs at her dismay, then smiles. “I’ll always catch you… even when you don’t want me to.”

Notes

I don't really know how getting a driver's license works, so I'm just making it up based off of prior information and imagination. Plus, it's different pretty much everywhere, so it's probably better this way.

What is your favorite kind of sandwich?
Is anyone else bothered like Darren with what she ranted about?
How cute is Harren?!
And what the hell happened with Jarren? - not that anyone really cares.

comment, rate, & subscribe. Thanks for reading!
~A