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It’s 10:37 in the morning and Harry’s day is already half over.
He’s been up since four, gulping down a bottle of water and getting a cup of oatmeal in him before heading out the door with sleepers still poking at the corners of his eyes. He followed Liam’s lead on their jog through the Seattle fog to the boathouse.
Maybe it isn't really half over, but it isn’t any wonder he’s this tired; he’s been trying to focus on the words on his computer screen more than the stiffness in his back for the past forty–five minutes, but it isn’t looking any more hopeful with each blink.
The lock to the front door clicks open, snapping Harry out of his daze in front of the glowing screen where he’s sitting at the kitchen table. Liam pushes through the door, covered in rain with a yoga mat slung over his shoulder.
“Harry.” He flicks on the lights in the kitchen. “You need to stop reading in the dark.”
“Okay, Dad,” Harry stands up, chair scraping across the hardwood. He shakes off the shrill screech to waddle over to the fridge, plucking out Liam’s carton of vanilla almond milk and a banana from the bowl on the counter. “How was class?”
“Lovely, as usual,” Liam says, unzipping his jacket, minding the rain rolling off his shoulders to carefully sling it over the back of a table chair. “I’m telling you, you’d be surprised how good you feel afterwards. I swear, I feel like—”
“I know, light as a feather. ‘I think I’m gonna go do some hill sprints over at Gasworks! Wanna come?’” Harry mocks in a Liam-like tone, picking up his glass of milk to take over to the table, “you tell me that every time you come back.”
“It’d sort out your back pain,” Liam says, poking at the fickle ‘Start’ button on the microwave for a bowl of oatmeal.
“But, Liam, don’t you realize you’re crazy? We work out, like... five hours a day. What could possibly possess you to want to do another hour?”
“Firstly, quit fibbing. We do not work out five hours a day, everyday.”
Harry groans. “It feels like it.”
“Do I need to remind you we’re training for the Olympics, not the Portland Fall Classic anymore?”
"To be fair, we've placed first at Portland two years in a row and are currently registered for Head of the Lake."
Liam bangs the side of the microwave a few times, eyes slit with inspection for any sign of life. “We really need a new microwave.”
Harry slumps back into his chair, peeling back his banana for a generous bite. It is all a bit surreal that he and Liam would ever get to this point; they’ve been rowing together for five years now, getting to know each other through the feathering of their oars, every catch and drive. They’ve not only challenged their physical strengths together on and off the water, but have held each other up through heartbreaks and grueling exams, pulled each other forward through the pressures of life as a teenaged Millennial.
Now they’re in Seattle, training under some of the best former Olympians and amid a cluster of other Olympic hopefuls filtering in from across the world. Harry never had dreams or aspirations growing up to become an Olympian like Liam did. He’s constantly reminded by how badly Liam’s wanted this for so long, how hard he’s worked, how much he loves the sport. And Harry feels a little guilty, not having found out crew was actually a serious thing until he was seventeen and through another growth spurt. It was Liam’s coach who lured Harry onto the water, and though his split times on the erg were embarrassingly slow to start, and he was pulling crabs every ten strokes the first month out on the water, Coach Walt didn’t give up on Harry.
He remembers the first time he and Liam strapped into a pair: his fingertips were numb from the autumn morning air, heart in his throat at his seat in the stern. Coach Walt was sipping on his cup of coffee, other hand settled on the wheel of the launch waiting for them to push off the dock. His socks were already soaked, a small puddle of water lining the shell of the boat from his sloppy first attempt to get seated.
“Ready?” Liam said behind him at the bow.
Harry nodded, then made a quick, “yes,” because if there’s anything he learned quickly from rowing, it’s clear communication.
“We’re not going to flip, if that’s what you’re nervous about.”
“I’m not,” Harry tried to look over his shoulder, numb knuckles white against the dock. And really, he wasn’t concerned about flipping. Harry was definitely nervous though; Walt pulled Harry aside after weight training two nights ago asking him to come in for an extra practice that week. He didn’t know he’d been singled out and paired up with the best rower on the team.
He’d never been in a pair before, no coxswain or an additional six bodies to guide and support him like the eight he had only ever practiced in until now. This felt so bare, so small. He was vulnerable.
“Any day now,” Walt called through his bullhorn on the launch. “The sun’s almost up!”
And they didn’t flip that first morning. Harry didn’t catch a single crab, though he did slow up the slide a few times and got Liam’s oar handle to his back. His socks dried, his shirt became soaked in sweat. He’d never felt better after a row in his life, and he was almost certain he’d never imagined an always stoney-faced Walt was capable of smiling that widely before.
The two of them went on to sweep and win at every regatta in the spring. Harry had a feeling Walt knew he could make this happen, and it felt wild then—traveling abroad with the club for more titles. Harry had never worked so hard for something in his life.
And that was how Liam became Harry’s confidant: the right to his left, the starboard to his port.
Harry snaps out of his daze to the buzz of the microwave starting up again. Liam leans back against the counter, arms folded with a smug grin.
“I can look for one on Craigslist?” Harry offers.
“No— I’ll sort it this time. I’d rather it not smell like kimchi and cupcakes.”
Harry shrugs, getting up to throw his banana peel and rinse his glass out in the sink.
“I’ll think about it.”
“About what?” Liam asks. “No negotiations, I’m buying us a brand new microwave. It won’t be a fix-it from the Re-Store, or Value Village—”
“I mean about going to yoga with you.”
“Oh,” Liam’s brows perk up. Harry can smell the brown sugar melting into the oats, and his tummy grumbles. “Put the milk away when you’re done, yeah?”
“Sorry, Dad.”
“Stop calling me ‘dad.’”
“But you’re being a total dad right now.”
“When am I not?” Liam blows over a spoonful of his cereal.
Harry watches the steam curl up Liam’s nose, and he can see the rain is picking up again outside the kitchen window. It’d been blustery during their morning run, orange leaves rustling up to their door and circling around their street.
“See, you even admit to being a dad.”
“If you insist on calling me Daddy—”
“Oh, Christ, Liam. You had to go there.”
“Ah, eating your words,” Liam finishes up the last of his oatmeal and drops his empty bowl into the sink, spoon clattering around the lip. “So, you can come with me on Thursday. After weight training.”
Harry shrugs. “I can’t believe you’re talking me into this.”
“You don’t have to listen to anything I tell you outside of the boat. You’re a free man, Styles.”
“Maybe I won’t go.”
“Trust me,” Liam steps forward, looming over Harry to press his palms into Harry’s shoulders, “you want to go.”
Harry tosses his banana peel in the direction of the garbage and misses by a couple feet. “Crap,” Harry whispers, back cracking as he twists in his chair.
Liam bends down to dispose of the peel before Harry could get up, “Just once, come with me. It’s only yoga.”
“Alright then,” Harry sighs, “it better be worth it.”
+
Harry is used to waking up early. He’s used to downing a bottle of water and running out the door within five minutes of opening his eyes. He’s used to starting his mornings covered in sweat, with fire in his lungs and a curse on his tongue. But on this particular morning, with the heels of his palms digging into a hot pink mat giving under the weight of his shoulders, Harry knows it’d be rude to break out in one, long, glorious, “Jesus fucking Christ.”
His spine has never felt so heavy, like every second that ticks by a vertebrae slips closer to his brain, blood filling up his skull to the tip of his nose and the crown of his head; he can’t help but bite his lip and huff out a breath through his nose, shaking the sweaty curls plastered and itching across his forehead.
He doesn’t even know what time it is, how long he’s been trapped in this dimly-lit, subterranean studio. It was freezing when he first walked in here with Liam, but now the cotton of his tee clings to his back tighter than the vise around his chest, an existential force wrapping its hands around each breath he tries to take in, setting him alight.
He can see his arms tremble under his weight, a dark shadow of his own reflection in the wall of mirrors mocking him out of the corner of his eye. For a hot second and in the middle of a fresh, shallow breath, Harry thinks about that twenty-something who came in with her floral mat and set up in front of him in her fitted lululemon get-up, and maybe, just maybe, right now would be another ideal moment to check up on her in the mirror.
He lifts his chin, eyes scanning up the back of her calves, and his shoulders pinch, punching out whatever air’s left in his lungs. His right elbow gives, almost sending him down onto the mat, but he lifts his left leg as soon as he catches a glimpse of Liam doing the same behind him in the mirror.
“Shit.” He can’t help but hum as his arms begin to waver again, swells of heat flushing through his cheeks, aches prickling at his biceps. “Not again.”
Absolute defeat is what he feels right now as his right foot digs into his mat, bartering with his body to restore balance. The ocean’s in his ears, roaring against his thrums of frustration; he’s training for the Olympics, can leg press three-hundred fifty pounds without breaking a sweat, yet he can’t even balance himself on two arms and a leg. Liam is going to have an earful by the end of this. He can’t believe after Liam pestering him for all these months that he finally caved. To make it even worse, he can’t believe how fucking easy Liam’s making all of this look. Liam assured him that he’d feel great, that doing this would help out the stress in his back.
Filthy liar is what he is.
He’s been miserable since five minutes in. Maybe it was less than that. Time inside the studio has stretched like a string of gum stuck on the bottom of his boots: stringy and highly dissatisfying.
Now Liam has his foot pointing to the ceiling.
Great.
Liam’s always been better than him in most instances: better at waking up on time, better at knowing exactly how to set the boat, better at making people take him seriously.
He lifts his left foot from the ground, slowly, slowly, keeping the muscles in his calf tight to raise it higher. He lifts it a little too quickly, nearly toppling down onto his side, but swings it out toward the mirror to keep his balance before lowering it.
All Harry wants to do right now is crawl back into a ball, like they did when they first started (God knows how many millennia ago), perhaps marinate in his own sweat and sorrow until it’s all over, sink into the black behind his eyes, and restore faith in himself to the opening chords of Stop This Train floating from the front of the room.
He nearly jumps out of his skin when he feels fingers circle his ankle, and another soothing brush of fingertips slipping up his leg to press up under his knee. Harry gulps down another breath, resisting the upward movement of his leg for a second before allowing whomever it is to guide him.
“Relax your shoulders,” he hears, his nose tipping closer to the mat, “don’t lock your elbows and spread your hands out more.”
Harry hesitates for a second, biting his lip as he moves his left palm over a few inches. He already feels more stable, though his right ankle is threatening to betray him.
“I’ve got you,” the instructor says, giving a gentle squeeze around the brush of skin above his knee cap. “You’re not goin’ down, I promise. Now, hold your stomach in tight, take two deep breaths in, and let it all out.”
He shifts his weight on his palms again, making sure they’re the safest distance apart, before following on the rest, shivering under the fluid weightlessness as his hips open up and the instructor’s hand slides higher up his thigh, rough palm grazing against the hairs of his leg. He’s perfectly balanced on two hands and one leg.
Harry isn’t usually so self-aware of how he smells when he works out, but a whole new wave of panic pinches through his wrists as he nearly drops to his elbows–
“Think about your breathing,” the hand squeezes around his ankle to bring Harry back into focus. “Fill your lungs, ease it out… there you go.”
And now, it’s like he’s rooted into the ground, palms driving through the mat, tension flowing through his fingertips. He’s solid, ball of his foot pressing into the floor, hips opening nearly parallel to the mirror, and he’s weightless. It feels so easy, lungs opening up again as droplets of sweat trickle down the slope of his nose, splashing into the rivets of the hot pink mat, tiny rivers reaching for his thumbs.
“Now,” the voice is floating from the front of the room, “ease your left leg down gently.” Harry’s elbows lock up again on impulse. But he lets out a deep breath to maintain a cool realization he was holding the position all on his own, lost in his own headspace just long enough to stop feeling the calloused fingers that were only grazing up his thigh a minute ago. “Slowly bend your knee and bring yourself back to downward dog. Yes–you guys are amazing. Beautiful.”
The instructor has them do the same position again, but this time opening up with the right leg. It only takes Harry a few seconds to get it right, and he lets out a deep, satisfying sigh as he holds the position.
They return to downward dog, stable on all fours, and follow the soothing cadence of the instructor. Harry’s trying to make sense of feeling anchored into the earth again, easing all the weight into his ankles.
Harry follows the wave of arms swafting upward, palms feathering toward the low ceiling. It reminds him of all the weekends his mother would drag him to Gemma’s ballet lessons. He tried to act disinterested, but it was beautiful to see the class go through the positions, ending in fifth, ankles crossed and taut, hands soft like spun silk dangling above their crowns. He wished he could manage to look that graceful.
Lululemon in front of him is bending her knee to bring her foot up to her thigh, palms meeting from heel to tip of her hands above her head. Harry follows her lead, leaning all of his weight onto his right hip, clasping his hands up high and barely clipping his wobbling knee with his left foot before stomping it back down into the mat to regain his balance.
“You’re a tree,” the instructor says, coming up to Harry from behind. Harry can feel his hand hovering over his shoulders, heat of his body lining up behind his legs. “You want to grow, stand tall,” a hand slides down the center of his back, fingertips drawing a line in the sweat gathering on his spine. Harry gives under the light pressure, shoulders rolling back with his head.
“There’s a string pulling you up,” the voice is so close to his ear, it’s deep and velvety. Harry wants to roll his head onto his shoulder, ask him how much sugar he puts in that green tea on his breath, but he keeps looking at Lululemon’s ponytail. “Remember, breathing. Breathing is everything.”
A hand slides around to his chest, palm splayed against his already racing heart. It feels like it’s going to beat through his skin from trying so hard, but now, proximity alone is turning his stomach into knots.
“Deeper,” the hand slips just over his stomach, palm digging just below his rib cage. “Come on, try it.”
His stomach caves in, collapsing under the weight of the hand, as he takes a breath in from the diaphragm, remembering how it is to breathe when he’s on the boat with Liam, sweep at a cool twenty strokes per minute, gliding across a glassy Lake Union, minding the tugboats and a clear sky over Gasworks.
Yeah, he gets it now, eyelids slipping closed to make the touches linger a little longer. He sways into the palm in the next breath, almost humming it back out deep from his core. Harry feels a little braver now, inching his left foot from the ground.
“Arms out, slowly bring them up along with your feet,” two hands anchor Harry down by his waist, hinging them forward just the slightest. There’s an invisible yard stick flanked across his back, and he’s stiff as a board, smile creeping across his face out of satisfaction and the teasing (perhaps the intentions are encouraging) thumbs circling against his hipbones.
This is what it’s like to be a tree: a pull at the hip, the thigh, the knee, the ankle, the foot, driving through the floor, unending and beginning, marveling upward and charged with ease, grace, comfort, support.
“That’s it. Perfect.”
Harry opens his eyes, and the warmth from his sides have gone up to his cheeks, holding a steady rhythm in his lungs, heart picking up again in his ears, watching the instructor side step his way to other struggling students. Maybe he follows his soft hands and golden hair from the corner of his eye, no, but he centers on this hold, in limbo from realizing how much sweat is working from every line out of his body, whilst feeling in such ease in this effortless pose.
Harry’s actually a tree.
Time picks up again, maybe hinders back into being just right, slowing down enough for Harry to make things right, to feel that relief like when his brain’s swimming around during a warm down after a ten mile run, bones melting into the floor with his chin tucked between his knees. He’s on autopilot, edging on hearing just enough to move, and curling into his own senses to be removed from his surroundings.
He’s flat on his back, sweat cooling on his hairline with his slowing heart rate. It’s dead silent in the studio, save the quiet rustle of his hair scratching against the mat as he tips his head to the left.
He’s decided, in this exact moment, that he never wants to get up from this spot. Ever.
“Harry,” Liam whispers, palm searing into his shoulder. “Harry, get up. It’s over.”
He doesn’t move, stays melted into the mat with his eyes closed, not letting any old Liam disrupt this serenity and deeply calculated breathing.
“You have to get up,” Liam says, voice getting closer to his ear, “they need to clear out for the next class.”
“Nuhm,” Harry turns his face away, resisting the urge to scrunch up his eyebrows.
He feels a hand slip under his shoulder, prying his bones from the mat. “Wake up, dear,” Liam tries again, finger prodding at his hip. Harry finds enough energy in his hand to smack Liam’s intrusions away, but yelps as soon as he feels a sloppy pair of lips planting the noisiest kiss on the corner of his mouth.
“Hey!” Harry darts his eyes open, rolling away from the kiss and onto the hardwood floor. It shocks him back into full consciousness, frosty air radiating from the mirror biting at his skin. He’s been stripped from the warmth from his own body heat that soaked into the mat that Liam’s now rolling up behind him.
Liam hops back up to his feet, hot pink mat slung over his shoulder. “Quit being such a Lazy Bone Jones.” He taps Harry’s hip with his barefoot.
“I like being a Lazy Bone Jones,” Harry whines, scowling at him in the mirror. “And you better get a shirt on.”
“Need a hand there?” the instructor says, walking over with a palm stretched out for Harry.
“Oh, he’s a big boy, Niall,” Liam calls from the other side of the studio.
“Excuse me, Liam–I actually, can’t feel my legs.” Harry takes the offering hand and hoists himself up to get a closer look at that charming grin.
“You must be new,” Niall plants his feet beside Harry to pull him up.
Harry teeters on his legs like a newborn colt, “Just my sea-legs,” he laughs, pointer fingers poking at the tops of his thighs and internally wincing at the edge of nerves skating through his words.
Niall steadies him again, hand coming up against his lower back, a spot pooling over into familiarity all too quickly. “Not bad for a novice.”
“Thanks, I’m a professional athlete,” he dusts off the side of his leg.
“This is Harry,” Liam slings an arm over Harry’s shoulder, hand slapping over the front of his chest then coming back up to ruffle his hair.
“Oof, gross!” he ducks away, pushing at Liam’s chest.
“Thanks for coming, Harry,” Niall smiles again, head nodding an extensive form of gratitude as he shoves his hands into the pockets of his black sweatpants, bright blue eyes between him and Liam, foot tapping against the floor.
“Yeah, yeah–was really nice. Liam’s been trying to talk me into coming for months now.”
“We do everything together,” Liam jumps in, arm slipping back down around Harry’s waist. He feels Liam give to a light squeeze, helpless to a giggle that swims from his lips. Liam knows it’s his weak spot.
Niall cocks his head to the side, arms crossing, “Everything?”
“Mhmm,” Harry says, “Row together, run together, moved to Seattle together. Why not do yoga together?”
“Been the happiest five years of my life with old Harry here,” Liam says.
“Cool,” Niall nods, hand coming up to dust back his soft, blond hair from his face. The apples of his cheeks are glowing a soft pink, flush running down to his chest, covered in a thin veil of sweat under the hot lights.
Harry swallows down whatever’s scratching at his throat, head nestling against Liam’s shoulder. He’s trying his best to figure out a way to wet his achingly dry lips while tallying up the number of times Niall’s lungs fill up his chest per minute. He flicks out his tongue, can taste the salt lined up on Niall’s collarbones (maybe it’s his own lip)–
“Can I get you some water?”
He freezes, eyes snapping back into focus and up at Niall. His tongue suddenly weighs seven tons, hanging out of the corner of his mouth with a trail of drool just trickling down his chin.
“Shoot,” Harry stands up straight, wiping the back of his hand across his chin. Fuck, he scolds himself, smooth. “Nah, I’m good, I’m good. I told you, I’m a professional.”
“You sure?” Niall asks.
Liam nudges the lip of his bottle against Harry’s cheek, “c’mon, drink up.”
“Later–”
“No,” Liam insists, tipping the bottle up against his lips now. Harry surrenders, taking a few gulps to appease him, bringing up his other hand to wipe at his mouth again. “Much better.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
“Anytime,” he winks, hand pinching at Harry’s waist again. Harry bends to a giggle.
Niall clears his throat. “Well… so, Payno–was just wondering if you’d maybe want to come to karaoke on Sunday?”
“Yes, karaoke!” Liam cheers, taking a sip from his bottle. “Sure man, where at?”
“The Rock Box–it’s happy hour all day, so we’re usually in there for hours. Swing by anytime after three if you’d like,” Niall grins, chest doing that sink and rise thing a little faster as his words speed up. “You should come by, too.”
It takes a hot minute for Harry to realize Niall’s extended the offer to him, that he’s suddenly being thrown into a whole new situation in which he can see Niall again. He’d planned to come to class–
“If you can, yeah? Or–do you even like karaoke?”
Harry stands up a little taller. “I hope you’re ready for the best rendition of More Than A Feeling you’ve ever heard.”
“Ever?” Niall cocks his eyebrow, lips twisting back into a reserved smile. “You sure about that?”
“I guess you have something to look forward to on Sunday now,” Harry shrugs, stepping away from Liam toward the door. He makes sure Niall’s keeping an eye on him, praying he doesn’t trip over his own feet as he winks.
And he can swear the color in Niall’s cheeks burns a little brighter, but Niall’s quick to turn on his heel to make his way to the back of the studio.
“Thanks for coming, Harry,” he waves.
“Later, Niall,” Liam says.
Liam’s quick to follow, mat rolled up under his arm as he leads them back to the lobby. Harry snatches his jacket off the coat rack, draping Liam’s plaid scarf around Liam’s neck before wiggling with his zipper.
“D’you like it?” Liam asks, tugging his gray beanie over his ears and picking up his water bottle.
“Yeah,” Harry says, patting down the soft cashmere against Liam’s chest, “I think I did.”
He pushes open the door, arctic autumn air biting at his skin through his jacket. He feels Liam dig into his pocket, plucking out his orange beanie to hand over.
“You’re gonna catch cold,” he says, “put it on.”
Liam starts up the steps ahead of Harry, feet crunching over the last of the brittle November leaves. The city’s wide awake and moving on Pike when he reaches the top of the stairs: more cyclists than cars making their way downtown, brooding art students bundled in their best secondhand flannel, the smell of fresh hops at the Elysian are spilling over into everyone’s morning brews from Stumptown espressos and Vita almond lattes.
It’s a bit unfair how stiff his bones are starting to feel, the cold seizing all sense of gooey, luscious relaxation he worked so hard for. He feels like the Tinman.
“I’d go again,” Harry pipes up.
“Would you?” Liam cranes his neck to look back at Harry before crossing the street.
Harry shivers into a gust of wind, dodging a fresh puddle and hitting back up on the curb. He loves the smell of the Hill after a fresh rain, how he can decipher the smell of cold; biting and pure. He feels a bit giddy now, unsure if the goosebumps creeping up his arms are from being outside, or that phantom recollection of a hand brushing against the hairs of his leg.
He bites at his lip, toe of his boot kicking a red bottle cap. He watches it skitter across the sidewalk ahead of him few feet before picking it up. He smiles.
“Definitely.”