It Takes Patience III: Stripped
Chapter 21: Search and See...
*Harry’s POV*
I lie awake in silence. The house is quiet and I’ve been here too many times before in the same position. I might have gotten two hours of sleep tops. The dream this time was on overdrive and I could feel my blood run cold every time I closed my eyes, even if it was just to blink. Green eyes stared back at me hovered over the body on the ground. Green eyes that were mine, but just as dead as the corpse that lies in a pool of its own blood under my fingertips. It was an out of body experience and the blood that stained his hands stained mine as well.
It’s said that no matter how hard you try, you can never truly remember how a dream starts, but I feel as if I must be an exception to that rule. It starts the same every time but every time there is a new end result that’s more sinister than the last. The worst part is, I see the meaning and understand every single one of them, but I can’t call her.
I looked at her number in my phone several times and decided against it. I won’t tell her, not now and if I had called her I know that my traitorous voice would have given me away. I woke up shaking and couldn’t even be in the room with the lights off for a while. I feel ridiculous. I’m almost twenty years old and still have nightmares that make me afraid of the dark, but even when all of the lights are on I fear that this is a dark that I can’t escape from.
The sun creeps up over the horizon slowly allowing the smallest bit of light to peek through the window of my room. I reach for my bedside lamp, finally able to turn off the light as I begin to drift to that medium somewhere between a conscious and unconscious mind. My eyes finally close but as they do I’m sucked in again face to face with dead green eyes. My heart beats quickly in my chest as I look at the shadow of myself. He launches towards me and I wake up again with a jolt, sick to my fucking stomach.
I run into the bathroom and empty the contents of my stomach into the porcelain bowl. I would love to blame my sick fit on a hangover but I know that’s not the truth, though the only thing that leaves my stomach is the sour, bitter, burn of the alcohol that I consumed last night.
“Harry?” I hear a light tapping on the door after my name is called but I don’t respond.
I wipe my mouth on the back of my hand before I flush and then rinse out my mouth and brush my teeth. When I go downstairs, my mum has a kettle on the stove and her hand flies to my forehead to check for a temperature.
“You’re clammy and pale. I heard you in the bathroom being sick. Do you feel alright love, because you look awful.”
“Good morning mum, how are you? Oh, hi Harry, good morning I’m just fine.” I speak sarcastically for myself and my mother hoping to evade her questioning as I look into the refrigerator for something to fill my now empty stomach.
It’s embarrassing enough that I had a bad dream, it’s even worse that I got sick behind it. She rolls her eyes before scrunching her nose at me.
“Good morning Harry. Are you alright?”
I close the fridge not exactly thrilled with the choices in front of me, but not exactly hungry either. I know I need to eat something, but the thought a full English breakfast makes me feel ill again. I grab a banana instead and sit down at the kitchen table while nodding my head yes, telling her that I had eaten too much last night and couldn’t digest it all. My eyes land on my mother’s left hand and I can feel the bile rise again. I put the banana down and fill a cup with tea quickly to swallow down the feeling.
My mum talks at me as she eats her breakfast, but I don’t really pay her my full attention. I have nothing to say to her until she brings up Reagan’s name after a beat of noticing that she’s not here. My eyes widen as I look at my phone wanting to call her now but quickly remembering that it’s only two o’clock in the morning there in LA.
“She’s on holiday. Went to visit her family, she’ll be back soon.” She’ll be back soon. I don’t know if I’m saying this to convince my mum or myself anymore.
My mum nods her head then walks outside to the post. When she comes back in her eyebrows are furrowed as she reads writing on an envelope.
“Harry what is this?” I glance over at her as I finish a text to Reagan.
“What’s what?” She holds out the letter to me with a hurt in her eyes that cuts me deeper than usual and I say the only thing that comes to mind.
“Fuck.”
*Reagan’s POV*
I was tired, drained really after my dinner with my parents and Channel. But I find myself wide awake as I lie in my bed. I’ve never lied so much in one sitting than I did a few hours ago, but for every question my parents asked about my sudden arrival home, I had an answer for them. Surprisingly enough, I don’t’ feel bad for lying this time because in all actuality I know that I’m doing it for the best.
I should really be asleep. There’s a long day ahead of me tomorrow with the therapist and the amount of work I have to catch up on for Dr. Koch.
As soon as I think about his work however, the zip-locked file folder comes back into my mind. I flip the covers off of myself and grab my laptop from the desk in my room and bring it back to my bed. The dim lighting from the laptop and the laptop alone brings an eerie feel to what it is that I’m about to do. When everything is finished loading on my desktop and my eyes adjust to the screen, I move my curser over the trash bin icon and double click to open it. What I’m looking for is the first file I see.
H.E.S.
I take a deep breath before I restore the file from the trash and save it to the computer. Just as I’m about to open it and look through everything I feel already know, I get a phone call from Harry himself. It startles me in a way and I almost feel as if it’s my saving grace, prying me away from something I feel I shouldn't be doing in the first place. I answer the call with a guilt ridden mind. Anything more that I want to know about Harry, I could just ask him. But these would be things that not even he knows wouldn’t they? My focused side cocks an eyebrow and smirks at me knowing that she’s won. I ignore her for now as I put all of my attention on H.
“Hello?”
“Reagan,” his voice sounds hoarse and it tears me in two to not be there right now. There’s a long pause before he says anything again and it spikes my worries through the roof, “did I wake you? What time is it there?”
“Two thirty a.m. but no, you didn’t wake me. Are you alright?”
He pauses again.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re lying Harry.” I click on the first document in the file as I listen to him speak. I notice it as Dr. Baker’s handwriting. The pages are scanned, but the print right now is too small to read on my screen, so I close it and click on the next document in the file while I wait for Harry to respond.
“I miss you that’s all.” I can hear his defensive tone and it sets my attention back on him again. I lower my laptop screen and grab my phone from in between my shoulder and my ear so that I can hold it properly.
“I miss you too. You sound so hoarse are you alright?” The light from the laptop calls me to open it fully once again, but I close it instead. I can at least wait until I’m off of the phone with him.
“I got into an argument with my mum.” Harry chuckles lightly after he speaks and I can almost see him running his hand through his hair as a nervous action.
“What about?”
“She knows,” he breathes out “she knows about everything, my court date, why you’re gone everything.”
My heart stops momentarily as I imagine the argument between the two of them and for a moment I can’t get my brain to form words, yet another thing that I feel to be my fault.
“Oh. I’m so sorry H.”
“It’s okay for the most part. Its not your problem.”
I’m listening to him, but I’m mostly distracted. I reopen the laptop and click on what I wanted to look at next, the letter addressed to me from Dr. Koch.
Clear your mind, and open your eyes while you’re away. A good therapist doesn’t allow their feelings to get in the way of what’s right in front of their eyes. This is against every rule in the book, but it is best hat you know what and who it is you are so ‘in love’ with Miss Stoger.
The letter is short and sour much like Dr. Koch’s attitude and as I scroll through the rest of the documents I land on a video file.
“What are you doing? Why are you awake?” Harry’s voice fills the gap in our conversation as I click on the video link and what I see next brings a lump to my throat that I don’t think that I’ll be able to speak around.
I lie awake in silence. The house is quiet and I’ve been here too many times before in the same position. I might have gotten two hours of sleep tops. The dream this time was on overdrive and I could feel my blood run cold every time I closed my eyes, even if it was just to blink. Green eyes stared back at me hovered over the body on the ground. Green eyes that were mine, but just as dead as the corpse that lies in a pool of its own blood under my fingertips. It was an out of body experience and the blood that stained his hands stained mine as well.
It’s said that no matter how hard you try, you can never truly remember how a dream starts, but I feel as if I must be an exception to that rule. It starts the same every time but every time there is a new end result that’s more sinister than the last. The worst part is, I see the meaning and understand every single one of them, but I can’t call her.
I looked at her number in my phone several times and decided against it. I won’t tell her, not now and if I had called her I know that my traitorous voice would have given me away. I woke up shaking and couldn’t even be in the room with the lights off for a while. I feel ridiculous. I’m almost twenty years old and still have nightmares that make me afraid of the dark, but even when all of the lights are on I fear that this is a dark that I can’t escape from.
The sun creeps up over the horizon slowly allowing the smallest bit of light to peek through the window of my room. I reach for my bedside lamp, finally able to turn off the light as I begin to drift to that medium somewhere between a conscious and unconscious mind. My eyes finally close but as they do I’m sucked in again face to face with dead green eyes. My heart beats quickly in my chest as I look at the shadow of myself. He launches towards me and I wake up again with a jolt, sick to my fucking stomach.
I run into the bathroom and empty the contents of my stomach into the porcelain bowl. I would love to blame my sick fit on a hangover but I know that’s not the truth, though the only thing that leaves my stomach is the sour, bitter, burn of the alcohol that I consumed last night.
“Harry?” I hear a light tapping on the door after my name is called but I don’t respond.
I wipe my mouth on the back of my hand before I flush and then rinse out my mouth and brush my teeth. When I go downstairs, my mum has a kettle on the stove and her hand flies to my forehead to check for a temperature.
“You’re clammy and pale. I heard you in the bathroom being sick. Do you feel alright love, because you look awful.”
“Good morning mum, how are you? Oh, hi Harry, good morning I’m just fine.” I speak sarcastically for myself and my mother hoping to evade her questioning as I look into the refrigerator for something to fill my now empty stomach.
It’s embarrassing enough that I had a bad dream, it’s even worse that I got sick behind it. She rolls her eyes before scrunching her nose at me.
“Good morning Harry. Are you alright?”
I close the fridge not exactly thrilled with the choices in front of me, but not exactly hungry either. I know I need to eat something, but the thought a full English breakfast makes me feel ill again. I grab a banana instead and sit down at the kitchen table while nodding my head yes, telling her that I had eaten too much last night and couldn’t digest it all. My eyes land on my mother’s left hand and I can feel the bile rise again. I put the banana down and fill a cup with tea quickly to swallow down the feeling.
My mum talks at me as she eats her breakfast, but I don’t really pay her my full attention. I have nothing to say to her until she brings up Reagan’s name after a beat of noticing that she’s not here. My eyes widen as I look at my phone wanting to call her now but quickly remembering that it’s only two o’clock in the morning there in LA.
“She’s on holiday. Went to visit her family, she’ll be back soon.” She’ll be back soon. I don’t know if I’m saying this to convince my mum or myself anymore.
My mum nods her head then walks outside to the post. When she comes back in her eyebrows are furrowed as she reads writing on an envelope.
“Harry what is this?” I glance over at her as I finish a text to Reagan.
“What’s what?” She holds out the letter to me with a hurt in her eyes that cuts me deeper than usual and I say the only thing that comes to mind.
“Fuck.”
*Reagan’s POV*
I was tired, drained really after my dinner with my parents and Channel. But I find myself wide awake as I lie in my bed. I’ve never lied so much in one sitting than I did a few hours ago, but for every question my parents asked about my sudden arrival home, I had an answer for them. Surprisingly enough, I don’t’ feel bad for lying this time because in all actuality I know that I’m doing it for the best.
I should really be asleep. There’s a long day ahead of me tomorrow with the therapist and the amount of work I have to catch up on for Dr. Koch.
As soon as I think about his work however, the zip-locked file folder comes back into my mind. I flip the covers off of myself and grab my laptop from the desk in my room and bring it back to my bed. The dim lighting from the laptop and the laptop alone brings an eerie feel to what it is that I’m about to do. When everything is finished loading on my desktop and my eyes adjust to the screen, I move my curser over the trash bin icon and double click to open it. What I’m looking for is the first file I see.
H.E.S.
I take a deep breath before I restore the file from the trash and save it to the computer. Just as I’m about to open it and look through everything I feel already know, I get a phone call from Harry himself. It startles me in a way and I almost feel as if it’s my saving grace, prying me away from something I feel I shouldn't be doing in the first place. I answer the call with a guilt ridden mind. Anything more that I want to know about Harry, I could just ask him. But these would be things that not even he knows wouldn’t they? My focused side cocks an eyebrow and smirks at me knowing that she’s won. I ignore her for now as I put all of my attention on H.
“Hello?”
“Reagan,” his voice sounds hoarse and it tears me in two to not be there right now. There’s a long pause before he says anything again and it spikes my worries through the roof, “did I wake you? What time is it there?”
“Two thirty a.m. but no, you didn’t wake me. Are you alright?”
He pauses again.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re lying Harry.” I click on the first document in the file as I listen to him speak. I notice it as Dr. Baker’s handwriting. The pages are scanned, but the print right now is too small to read on my screen, so I close it and click on the next document in the file while I wait for Harry to respond.
“I miss you that’s all.” I can hear his defensive tone and it sets my attention back on him again. I lower my laptop screen and grab my phone from in between my shoulder and my ear so that I can hold it properly.
“I miss you too. You sound so hoarse are you alright?” The light from the laptop calls me to open it fully once again, but I close it instead. I can at least wait until I’m off of the phone with him.
“I got into an argument with my mum.” Harry chuckles lightly after he speaks and I can almost see him running his hand through his hair as a nervous action.
“What about?”
“She knows,” he breathes out “she knows about everything, my court date, why you’re gone everything.”
My heart stops momentarily as I imagine the argument between the two of them and for a moment I can’t get my brain to form words, yet another thing that I feel to be my fault.
“Oh. I’m so sorry H.”
“It’s okay for the most part. Its not your problem.”
I’m listening to him, but I’m mostly distracted. I reopen the laptop and click on what I wanted to look at next, the letter addressed to me from Dr. Koch.
Clear your mind, and open your eyes while you’re away. A good therapist doesn’t allow their feelings to get in the way of what’s right in front of their eyes. This is against every rule in the book, but it is best hat you know what and who it is you are so ‘in love’ with Miss Stoger.
The letter is short and sour much like Dr. Koch’s attitude and as I scroll through the rest of the documents I land on a video file.
“What are you doing? Why are you awake?” Harry’s voice fills the gap in our conversation as I click on the video link and what I see next brings a lump to my throat that I don’t think that I’ll be able to speak around.
Notes
Hi Loves Hello New and Faithful subscribers!!! I have another chapter for you all because I love you! It's short I know and I'm sorry :( but I'm working on the next chapter now. What did you all think of this chapter? What did Reagan see? I feel so bad for her and H. Do you all think that Reagan is too curious? Should she have just deleted the file that Dr. Koch sent to her? Please give me loads of comments!!! I want this one to have just as many or more than last book (1,018) so please tell me what you're thinking on the chapters and what I should work on in the book in general Also please vote and subscribe if you haven't done so already and you're enjoying the story! Votes and Subscriptions are so inspiring guyyyyyysss
I LOVE YOU ALL FOR READING AND AND please go check out my new story The Resistance and @wonderful's new story Paper Stars Xx!
@XOXOH
Hi there lovely, I am a big fan of your books and you don't know how happy I am to see you back here. I LOVE THIS TRIOLOGY so dam much......so let me get this straight....you are not updating this story anymore on here? You are only going to continue this story on wattpad?? .....despite what decision you make I will be waiting for you because I want to know what will HAPPEN ....sorry I am weird xxx
8/22/15