I hear you calling in the dead of night - Thelonelycoast (2024)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.
I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

No one really notices Marcel. And why should they? He’s taken every opportunity to make himself as small as possible (which is harder than you’d think with giant, unwieldy limbs that aren’t entirely under his command yet and glasses with lenses as thick as the Hubble telescope). Seriously - if Marcel stares at the ground long enough on a sunny day, he’s sure to ignite an unsuspecting family of ants. Luckily, for the local bug population, there’s very few sunny days in England.

If Marcel’s learned anything in sixteen short years, it’s that the only thing worse than being invisible is being noticed for the wrong reason. He’s been stuffed in enough lockers and endured enough atomic wedgies to sort out that much. Marcel’s mum is convinced that once he’s in uni, things will be different. That no one will care that his glasses could double as co*ke bottles or that he wears his trousers a smidge too high on his waist or that he looks like he dresses primarily from Mark and Spencer’s 1974 Autumn line (brown tweed was a staple of British fashion as far as Marcel was concerned). But uni’s still a long way off and in the meantime, Marcel has to cope somehow.

So, he treats school like a job - just a mandatory obligation - so he can move on to the next phase of his life. He goes to his lessons, sits somewhere in the middle rows (so he can’t be lumped with the nerds and brown-nosers up front or the bad boys blowing spit-wads at the ceiling in the back). He never goes to the common room if he can help it and certainly not the canteen. Marcel’s asthma is bad enough that he has a doctor’s note excusing him from PE, so he spends his free period in the library, chatting with the middle-aged librarian, Alma, who recommends books for him to read and is pretty much his only friend.

Marcel eats lunch in the disabled toilet every day, cheese and Branston pickle on white-bread in one hand and an open book in the other (occasionally the food actually makes its way into his mouth and doesn’t just slop down the front of his sweater vest as he hangs on the author’s every word.) No one seems to notice his absence and he gets average enough grades – not high enough to merit academic accolades and not low enough to get him in trouble – so he doesn’t draw attention to himself that way either.

In fact, Marcel’s so invisible that if his teachers don’t call on him in lessons - and they rarely do - Marcel can go whole days without speaking to anyone other than his mum, his sister, Gemma, and his cat, Dusty.

But it’s fine. Marcel likes his routines. He likes eating the same thing for lunch every day and walking the same way home from school. He likes kissing his mum on the cheek when he comes or goes. He likes going up to his room after college to read in the picture window, tucked with a cuppa under a rug, the reassuring warmth of Dusty curled against the back of his knees. His life is predictable, but it’s safe and it’s the best he can hope for.

And if he just so happens to have a tiny, miniscule crush on the footie captain, Louis Tomlinson, well, that’s no one’s business but his own.

Except, one day everything goes horribly wrong. It’s raining - the fast, sudden sort of rain - that makes the roads unnaturally slick and treacherous. Which means that the hatchback barreling down Marcel’s lane can’t break in time to avoid hitting Dusty, who’s trying to dart under a parked car to escape the downpour.

Marcel’s walking home from school, the same route he always takes - rain or shine - his suffocating tweed pants tucked into hunter green Wellies, the hood of his rain slicker drawn up against the torrent of water now pelting down on him from the sky, when it happens. It’s all so quick, he has no time to react, much less try to stop it.

Afterward, when he’s kneeling in a puddle in the middle of the road, choking back wet sobs and cradling the body of his lifeless cat - the cat he’s had since he was six years old - his instinct for self-preservation completely falls away. It doesn’t matter in that moment that Liam Payne, who’s at the top of a social ladder Marcel hasn’t even seen fit to climb, sees him like this - completely collapsing in on himself. It doesn’t matter that the world he’s tried so hard to keep out has all come flooding in without his consent. Nothing really matters at all, except that Dusty is gone and she’s never coming back.

For a second, through his fogged-up glasses, Marcel’s not even sure it is Liam, though it certainly looks like his car. But then there’s a firm hand on his shoulder and Liam is crouching down beside him. And it’s like Marcel’s been waiting for this day to come. Like a shoddily built dam holding back a charging river, you can only hold life at bay for so long before it comes rushing in of its own accord.

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry - mate - I -” Liam’s voice cracks miserably as he puts a hand on Dusty’s wet, cooling fur where her broken body is laid out over Marcel’s lap, blood seeping into his clothes. The damp has crept up through the seat of Marcel’s trousers and he’s soaked straight through. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he realizes that he’s shivering, but he doesn’t feel the cold any longer. He just feels numb.

It’s Liam Payne’s fate in life to have soulful puppy dog eyes and a slightly down-turned pout, making him look as harmless and eager to please as a golden retriever, so Marcel can’t even muster up the energy to properly hate him. But he really wishes he could. It would be so much easier if he could.

Marcel doesn’t say anything, can’t make words form around the syrupy mixture of snot and tears coagulating in his throat, like a stopper in a bath drain. His sobs take a slightly hysterical turn, which leads to grotesque gasping. He fumbles blindly for his inhaler. Only he can’t see past his fogged up lenses and the rain and the zipper on his backpack is stuck and - OhGod – Marcel’s going to die - he’s going to die as unattractively as possible in front of Louis Tomlinson’s best mate with his dead cat lying across his lap. Because of course.

“Are you - are you all right, mate?” Liam squints at him, the soft expression in his warm brown eyes growing even more concerned and pitiable. Marcel is very far from all right. And Liam pounding him on the back like he’s trying to expel a co*cktail shrimp that went down the wrong pipe isn’t helping matters. Marcel makes a frantic, wheezing gesture toward his throat meant to convey he’s having an asthma attack, but which probably just makes him look like a chicken flapping about after its head’s been cut off. He can’t stop coughing and he’s fairly sure his nail beds and lips are already turning a worrying shade of blue as his airways narrow, making it harder and harder to drag oxygen into his starved lungs.

Liam must get the general idea because just when spots are beginning to swim behind Marcel’s darkening vision, just when he thinks, “well that was disappointing”, his lips encounter something metallic and solid and Liam Payne is depressing the canister with a quick alleviating “pffft”.

“It’s okay. You’re fine. Just breathe,” Liam says softly, rubbing Marcel’s back in an attempt at reassurance, only slightly undermined by the hard tremor in his voice. If Marcel was even mildly coherent, he might protest the hand now carding through his rain damp hair, loosening the curls he had spent so much time and effort trying to tame into submission that morning with only fortitude and styling wax. If he had his wits about him at all, Marcel might feel embarrassed that Liam Payne is in fact cradling his long, string bean body to his broad chest so Marcel wouldn’t pass out and conk his head on the pavement.

Marcel’s still dizzy and weak, but he’s able to take tiny, bird-like breathes into lungs that still feel like they’re being squeezed by a fist. He’s so out of it that he doesn’t even try to stop Liam when he heaves Marcel up like he’s carrying a bride over the thresh-hold and situates him in the passenger seat of his hatchback. Liam returns a minute later, laying a bundle onto Marcel’s lap, and the slam of the car door is all that Marcel’s aware of for the next little while.

When Marcel comes to, it’s to the sound of hushed voices speaking over him and the familiar patter of rain on the roof. He’s warm and oddly comfortable considering - lying under a heap of blankets and dressed in soft, dry clothes - though he has no idea where he is or how he’s gotten here.

“You don’t even know his name?” asks someone, incredulously, in a high-pitched voice that sounds strangely like Louis Tomlinson’s.

“Forgot to ask between killing his cat and giving the kid a damn asthma attack,” Liam replies snidely.

Marcel blinks awake slowly, just as a soft hand brushes his hair back over his forehead. “All right, love?” A woman’s face is staring down at him, smiling beatifically, her features slightly blurred and out of focus. For a split second, Marcel’s pretty sure he’s dead and that she’s an angel. But if he was really dead, he wouldn’t need his glasses to see, would he?

“Where am I?” he asks, struggling to sit up. Only to see what looks like - to his less than 20/20 vision - Louis Tomlinson, sitting cross-legged on the foot of the bed - which certainly helps to explain why Marcel’s feet have gone numb. Though it doesn’t explain what he’s doing here.

“Looks who’s awake,” Louis grins, stretching out his leg to poke Marcel in the side with his toe. Which shouldn’t make Marcel’s whole body erupt into goose bumps, but does anyway.

“Sorry, I didn’t know what to do - Louis’ mum’s a nurse so-” Liam babbles uncertainly, handing Marcel his glasses. He slips them into place, the room coming into sharp focus around him.

The walls are dark blue and papered with Man-U posters. There’s a flat screen television directly across from him and an accompanying game system, surrounded by a tangled nest of controllers. There are heaps of clothes lying all over the floor, an open pizza box with only crusts left in it and a cereal bowl filled with what Marcel can only guess is coagulated milk or yogurt. When he sees the L and T hanging on the door, it dawns on him that he’s in Louis Tomlinson’s bedroom. In Louis Tomlinson’s bed. Maybe even wearing Louis Tomlinson’s clothes. With Louis Tomlinson’s legendary bum planted on his feet like it belongs there. The idea makes him dizzy all over again and he must go pale because Louis’ mum’s face tightens in concern.

“Take it easy,” she instructs, helping him to lie back down on the mound of pillows, which now that Marcel thinks of it, smell suspiciously of Louis Tomlinson’s cologne and shampoo. Not that he’s gotten many opportunities to get close enough to smell them - but - well - it’s what he imagines Louis would smell like. “I gave you a steroid injection, so you should be breathing a bit easier,” Louis’ mum says, rubbing Marcel’s chest like he’s five again and home from school with a tummy ache. “But you’ll still want to take it easy. You gave us all a scare,” she frowns, patting his arm.

Marcel glances over at Louis and Liam, but they don’t look like they’ve had a scare. In fact, they’re both studiously avoiding his eyes. “Now Louis, come help me with the girl’s tea and let your friend get some rest.”

“Mum, he’s not my friend,” Louis whines as he follows his mum around the corner and down the staircase. Liam stands awkwardly at the foot of the bed, staring down at his sneakers.

“Can I see her?” Marcel asks softly. Liam nods and retrieves the wet, lifeless bundle from the windowsill and sets in Marcel’s arms. It’s not until Marcel’s holding her that he realizes Liam wrapped Dusty up in his jacket. It’s proper ruined now - the silk lining stained with blood and dirt - but it’s an oddly touching gesture that gets Marcel’s throat tightening.

“I’m so sorry -” Liam starts again, but Marcel just shakes his head.

“It’s okay. It was an accident. Thanks for um, for helping me out - before - I know that - just thanks.”

“Yeah. Course.” Liam eases the bundle from Marcel’s arms. “I’ll see if I can find a nice box for her, okay?”

Marcel nods, hot tears seeping from the corners of his eyes. He takes off his glasses and lets his heavy head drop back to the pillow and he absolutely does not turn his face to suck in the scent of Louis Tomlinson as he falls back into dreams.

When Marcel wakes up, Louis is seated at his desk, features chiseled into stark relief by the blue glow of his computer screen. He’s got a word document open in the background - no doubt the history paper they have due tomorrow - but he’s ignoring it in favor of typing messages to someone in gchat, smiling to himself periodically as he reads their responses. Probably his girlfriend, Marcel thinks sadly.

Unlike Marcel, who couldn’t be more invisible if he wore the Invisibility cloak from Harry Potter, everyone knows Eleanor Calder. She’s the prettiest girl in Sixth Form and even if Marcel tried to forget she exists - she’s everywhere - on the cheer squad and in the choir, in the debate club and on the tennis team. In the yearbook, she was voted Nicest Hair, Prettiest Smile and one half of the Cutest Couple (the other half being Louis Tomlinson of course).

Louis quickly closes out of the chat and spins his chair around when he hears the bed shift. Marcel sits up slowly, blearily rubbing his eyes. He must have gotten hot sometime in his sleep because the blankets are all kicked down to the bottom of the bed and his curls are pasted to his face with sweat. At home, he usually just sleeps naked.

“Good dream?” Louis smirks, gazing pointedly at Marcel’s crotch. And Oh-sh*t, Marcel totally does not have a boner, and even if he did, it totally wouldn’t be tenting out the front Louis Tomlinson’s borrowed jogging bottoms. The thought suddenly occurs to Marcel that someone must have stripped him out of his wet clothes and changed him into Louis’ sweats, someone that might even have been Louis himself.

Marcel’s face floods with heat as he tries in vain to cover himself. “Eh, those sweats have seen worse,” Louis says kindly.

“What time is it?” Marcel asks, drawing his knees up to cover his uh - situation - and blindly groping along on the bedside table for his glasses.

“Seven o’clock. We already ate supper, but I’m sure mum could fix you something if you’re hungry-”

“No, I - I should call my mum. She’ll be worried.”

Louis shrugs, slipping his headphones on and pulling his chat back up. “Suit yourself.”

Marcel quickly explains the situation to his mum (omitting the bit about the asthma attack so he doesn’t worry her) and after checking with Louis for his address, she says she’s on her way. Marcel gathers his things (Louis’ mum washed his clothes and they smell delightfully of the Tomlinsons' laundry powder).

She makes Marcel a cuppa as he waits and insists on packing him up some homemade lasagna for later. “Poor thing. Must be starved,” she says as she makes him a bag, sneaking in a tinfoil packet of homemade chocolate chip cookies.

Louis’ sisters slowly creep into the kitchen one by one, eager to get a look at the wet, bedraggled creature their brother had rescued from the rain (Marcel that is, not the cat. It’s too late for poor Dusty). They’re all adorable and blond and look vaguely like an advert for the Virgin Suicides movie.

By the time Marcel’s mum arrives, Daisy is sitting on Marcel’s lap and they are coloring in a picture of a unicorn together at the kitchen table. Whatever might be said of Marcel’s lacking social skills he’s a hit with children. Louis watches them quietly from the doorway, his arms crossed, an indiscernible expression on his face, which is half lost in shadow.

Louis and Marcel’s mum stand in the driveway chatting for a few minutes as Marcel drags himself into the passenger seat, exhausted and weary, the cardboard box containing Dusty weighing down on his lap like a cement block.

Marcel glances back only once at the rear-view mirror as they pull out of Louis’ driveway and sees Louis’ face framed in the warm, golden light of the living room window, before the boy quickly shuffles the curtain back into place.

Marcel realizes, with a start, that Louis never even asked his name.

Marcel stays out of school the next two days at his mother’s insistence. (Louis’ mum told her about the attack and she’s been fretting over him ever since, hovering about his room like a bumblebee in a rose garden.) Marcel doesn’t like people to make a fuss over him, but he’s more than happy to spend a few days in bed catching up on reading. (The precarious stack of library books on his bedside table is about ready to topple over.)

When Marcel’s lost in a book, he doesn’t dwell nearly as much on Dusty and has even less time to think about Louis - how bright and blue his eyes are and how intoxicating his sheets smelled. (Marcel may or may not continue to wear Louis’ sweats for the next three days, until their scents are so intermingled, he can’t pick Louis’ out from his own.) But other than that, things are surprisingly the same.

As long as Marcel is reading, he’s fine. As long as he follows his routines, he’s okay. As long as everything is done in the right order and all the things in his room are in their designated spots, he can get through this. It’s only when he’s read his last sentence of the night and turns off the lamp beside his bed, that he lies there breathing in Louis’ lingering scent and feeling a horrible, unnamable ache in his chest. He just wants thing to go back to the way things were - when his crush on Louis Tomlinson was not crushing him.

They have a small funeral in the back garden for Dusty the day after the accident and though Marcel still feels wretched about it, it helps to get some closure on the whole thing. If only he could bury his heart in a box in the ground, then maybe he could forget about Louis too.

By the time Marcel returns to school on Monday, he’s looking to put the whole incident behind him. Except...when he sits in his stall alone at lunch, his sandwich doesn’t taste as good as it normally does and his eyes keep skimming over the same four words in his book. Like it or not - something’s changed. Marcel’s had a taste of another life and he’s finding his own life is just not enough anymore. He finds himself wondering what Louis is doing - probably sitting in the cafeteria surrounded by mates - making them all laugh ‘til they snort co*ke out their noses. Probably. What he’s definitely not doing is thinking of Marcel. Whose name he doesn’t even know.

Marcel brought Louis’ clothes and his mum’s tupperware to school to give back to him and it’s been sitting in his locker all day like a ticking time bomb, the last physical reminder of that day other than the crooked wooden cross now in Marcel’s flower garden. It’s mostly an excuse to talk to Louis again, but Marcel’s always been unfailingly polite and it would be wrong of him to keep Louis’ things (especially now that they no longer smell like him).

But Marcel doesn’t see Louis all day - he’s not in the one lesson they share together - and Marcel doesn’t pass him in the hallways between lessons. Marcel tries to pretend the horrible feeling churning in his gut isn’t crushing disappointment, but it’s getting harder to lie to himself. He’s completely despondent by the end of the day and there’s no longer any denying it. Louis Tomlinson has got a hold on him.

Marcel does see Liam on the way to English, but Liam’s with Zayn and his eyes pass over Marcel and flick guiltily away without even an acknowledging nod. So things are back to normal, which should please him, but for some reason, Marcel feels angry and hurt. How dare Liam kill his cat and nearly him as a consequence and just act as if nothing’s happened? Something did happen and the fact that no one’s acknowledging it makes Marcel’s blood boil. Is he - is his life - so utterly inconsequential? Is he so thoroughly invisible that no one would notice if he was alive or dead?

The thought gives him an uneasy feeling in his stomach. He’s never cared if he mattered, as long as he mattered to the people important to him - namely his mum and Gemma and Alma, the librarian. But suddenly, he wants people to like him. Although wanting people to like him hadn’t been enough to keep kids from bullying him, he reminds himself. Wanting their approval and friendship hadn’t been enough to avoid being pantsed by Stan Lucas in front of their whole swim class in Year Five.

Marcel tries to pay attention in History lessons, but he finds himself doodling in the margins of his notebook instead of taking notes, writing LT & MS over and over until he realizes what he’s doing and angrily scribbles it out. By the time his last lesson ends, he stalks off, determined to find Louis, return his things and wash his hands of this whole bloody mess. Marcel just wants to put the whole thing behind him. Nothing good came of wanting to be friends with people and certainly nothing good came of a gay nerd’s crush on the school’s star footie player.

Louis is usually either on the pitch or in the auditorium after lessons (he’s ace at drama in addition to being the footie captain), so when Marcel doesn’t see Louis on the field, he wanders back towards the school, the bag with Louis’ clothes like an anchor in his clenched hand, dragging him down. It’s the latest Marcel’s been at school in years. He long ago learned that to linger was to invite bullies to pick on him, so he’s usually out the door the second final bell rings.

After being in the bright sunlight of the pitch, the utter blackness of the auditorium is like plunging to the cold bottom of a lake. Louis isn’t there and Marcel feels like he’s drowning. He tugs his inhaler from his trouser pocket and takes a steadying puff, trying to alleviate some of the growing tightness in his chest. It’s cool and eerily silent in the auditorium, just rows of darkened seats facing a stage set in shadow. Marcel wonders what it feels like under the bright lights. What it feels like to have everyone’s eyes on you. He slips between the seats like a shadow, leaving nothing of himself behind.

He’s about to turn around when he hears a faint rustling sound backstage. Heart pounding, he climbs the stage stairs, parting the thick velvet curtain that leads behind the scenes. It’s musty and dark back there, the walls and floor painted a uniform black. The only light is coming from a small dressing table, where a girl is seated with her back to him, putting on lipstick. Marcel’s never seen the girl before and it’s strange, because she’s oddly striking, so he thinks he would remember her.

Her eyes flick up to meet his in the mirror and she drops the tube of lipstick with a clatter, spinning toward him, fury etched into her features. “What are you doing here?” she demands, in a much deeper voice than Marcel imagined her having.

“I’m sorry -” he stammers. “I was uh - I was looking for Louis - Louis Tomlinson - from the uh, from the footie team-”

“I know who Louis bloody Tomlinson is, you twat,” the girl responds, rolling her eyes. Marcel takes a step closer and he doesn’t know what possesses him, but he reaches out and uses his thumb to daub the stray lipstick from the girl’s upper lip where it smeared when he startled her. It’s only as he’s running his finger over the girl’s mustache that it hits him. Other than the dress and the wig, the girl bears a striking resemblance to - Oh sh*t, oh sh*t - Marcel is in so much trouble.

The boy’s long eyelashes flutter shut as a shudder runs through him. “You won’t tell anyone will you?” he asks softly.

“Zayn?” Marcel squeaks. Zayn Malik, the toughest kid at school? It was general knowledge that he had spray-painted a naked woman on the teacher’s lounge wall, though it had never been proven, and Marcel remembers the boy lighting a cigarette in the middle of Maths once.

“Well, who the bloody hell else would it be?” Zayn snaps.

Marcel should run. He knows he should. It’s the only option. He should turn around and dash out of the auditorium and pretend this never happened. But he sees the pain on Zayn’s face and he just can’t. With trembling legs, Marcel forces himself to sit down on the bench beside Zayn, praying to God he’s not about to get punched.

Zayn’s arms are crossed defensively over his chest, pushing up his fake breasts, and there are silent tears streaming down his face, cutting through his careful makeup.

“Don’t cry,” Marcel says softly, touching Zayn’s tattooed forearm. “You’ll ruin your makeup.” Zayn sniffles, but doesn’t say anything. Marcel takes a tissue from the box on the table and gently swipes it over Zayn’s high-cheekbones, ignoring the way the boy’s eyes flutter shut, his red-stained lips parting slightly to let out the breath he was holding.

Zayn opens his eyes - they look painfully gold in the light - inspecting Marcel as if he just exited from an alien spacecraft.

Marcel picks up an eye-shadow compact, toying with it. “May I?”

Zayn nods slowly and closes his eyes obediently so Marcel can stroke blue shadow over his lids. Marcel knows blue works best with brown eyes from reading his sister’s old Cosmos. (It’s also how he knows where the female G-spot is, though he doubts that information will ever come in handy.)

“I used to do this for my sister all the time,” he explains, though he’s hardly the one that needs to explain. Zayn’s the one in a dress from the drama department. Still, it has the unintended effect of loosening Zayn’s shoulders and he relaxes a bit when he realizes Marcel isn’t going to humiliate him - at least not immediately.

“You’ve got great eyelashes. You hardly even need mascara,” Marcel finds himself saying, just to bring a smile to the boy’s face. Zayn’s lips twitch up at one corner, trying to suppress a grin at the compliment.

When he’s finished, Marcel lets out a tiny contented sigh as Zayn examines his own reflection. He did good, although it helped that Zayn had a lot to work with. “You look beautiful,” he smiles.

Zayn laughs abruptly, startled. “You understand that under any other circ*mstance, I would have to punch you for saying that - "

“Right. Sorry,” Marcel fumbles under the bench for his backpack and the bag for Louis. “I’ll just - I’ll go now-”

“Wait,” Zayn grabs his wrist, his grip surprisingly tight for a guy wearing a dress. “What’s your name, kid?”

“Mar-Marcel,” he stammers, pushing his glasses back up as they slid down his nose.

“Nice to meet you Mar-Marcel. Have you got a middle name?”

“Uh, Harry. But I don’t use that - it was my dad’s - ”

“Great. I’ll call you Harry,” Zayn says, pounding him on the back. “Marcel’s awful. No offense.” Zayn scrutinizes Harry for a second, as if he’s trying to figure him out.

“Now tell me, what are you trying to find Louis Tomlinson for?”

Harry slides his sleeves down over his hands to hide the ink stains, where the MS & LT rubbed off on his skin from his notebook. “It’s a long story,” he mumbles, dropping his chin to his chest.

“You know that if you say anything about this, I’ll have to kill you-”

“I wouldn’t! I swear,” Harry yelps.

“It’s okay. I believe you,” Zayn laughs. Harry starts to gather up his things, but Zayn stops him again. “Hey, what’s your prescription?”

“Sorry?”

Zayn taps under his eye. “Um, 7.5 in both eyes. Why?”

“No reason. Well. See ya,” Zayn dismisses Marcel with a wave.

***

So first, Liam Payne runs over Harry’s cat with a car and then, Harry wakes up in Louis Tomlinson’s bed and if that wasn’t enough, he rounds it all out by stumbling in on Zayn Malik dressed in drag. It’s all like some weird horrible nightmare, easy enough to forget in the light of day. That is, until Harry’s leaving lessons after final period the next day and hears someone calling his name.

“Hey! Harry, hey!” At first Harry keeps walking, nose buried in his book, because no one here knows him by that name, or by any name really, and even if they did, they wouldn’t call it aloud. But then he hears it again and when he glances up, nearly tripping over his own two feet, Zayn Malik is leaning against the chain link fence by the field and he’s – he’s waving at him.

Zayn’s wearing a white t-shirt and a fitted leather jacket over impossibly tight jeans and a pair of boots that look as if they would leave an impressive imprint on your arse when he kicked it. Zayn flicks the cigarette he’s smoking onto the ground, the cherry still burning, dangerously close to a small pile of dry leaves. “Are you deaf as well as blind then?”

“Oh, I uh-” Harry blushes, wondering if this is the part where Zayn starts rearranging his speccy face. At least he’ll have an excuse to buy new glasses - the tape on these keeps rubbing against the bridge of his nose.

“Need a lift?” Zayn asks, handing Harry a gleaming black bike helmet before he can respond.

Zayn throws one leg over the sleek motorcycle parked at the curb, slipping his aviators into place. He looks like sex on wheels. Harry takes a puff of his inhaler.

“On - on that?” he asks, eyes growing wide. He’s never been on a motorcycle and all that he can think in that moment is: what would my mum think?

“Sorry, my unicorn’s in the shop,” Zayn smirks and oh - oh, is Zayn Malik taking the piss out of him? Zayn pats the seat behind him. “Come on. Hop on, babe.”

Harry blushes at the term of endearment, but slides into place behind Zayn nonetheless, taking his glasses off and tucking them into his shirt front pocket before he puts the helmet on.

Zayn revs the motor and turns his head over one shoulder to talk over the loudly purring engine. “You’re gonna wanna hang on-” he warns, before peeling out.

Jolted, Harry grabs onto Zayn’s waist just in time, clinging to him for dear life as Zayn turns the corner heading away from the school. Harry’s pretty sure he’s digging nail marks into Zayn’s hips, but after turning down a few roads he loosens his grip and forces himself to open his eyes, feeling the rush of wind rolling over his body like a wave. He wishes he could feel it in his hair, but he doesn’t dare take off his helmet or relinquish his hold on Zayn for one second.

Zayn smells delicious (not better than Louis because no one smells better than Louis as far as Harry is concerned, but great nonetheless) - like coconut and lime and cigarette smoke and leather. The solid feel of Zayn’s warm body slotted between Harry’s legs and the vibration of the engine has Harry’s dick stiffening and he slides back slightly on the bench so he’s not right up against Zayn’s ass. They’ve driven five blocks when Harry realizes he never told Zayn where he lives.

Harry’s pretty sure everyone in Zayn’s family is secretly a supermodel. If he didn’t have a complex before, he’s pretty sure he has one now. Zayn’s got three gorgeous sisters with dark, shining hair and heavily lashed eyes that almost rival Zayn’s (almost) and all three of them pile on top of him in a fog of perfume and giggles the second he’s in the door. Whatever bad boy image he tries project at school, it’s obvious that at home, it’s a totally different story.

“I’m Trisha,” Zayn’s mum introduces herself, while Zayn’s indisposed.

Harry wipes his sweaty palm against his trouser leg before shaking her hand, eternally grateful that his hardon’s gone down enough to not be noticeable. “Harry.”

“Would you two like some tea?” Trisha asks, as Zayn grabs Harry’s hand and all but drags him up the carpeted steps.

“No thanks, mum,” Zayn shouts back over his shoulder.

Zayn doesn’t let go of Harry’s hand until they’re in his bedroom and he only releases it then so he can slam the door behind them. His room’s amazing - the walls covered from floor to ceiling with spray painted graffiti and these giant colorful canvases propped up against every available surface. It smells faintly of turpentine and oil paint and that Zayn-smell Harry caught a whiff of earlier on the bike.

Harry gazes around him in awe. “Did you do all this?”

Zayn shrugs, flopping down on his unmade bed, arms behind his head. “I like to keep occupied.”

Harry looks around for somewhere to sit, but gets hit in the face with a balled-up towel instead. “Go shower. It’s in there.”

“Sorry? Do I - ” Harry discreetly sniffs at his armpit. “Do I smell?”

Zayn snorts. “Nope. Gotta get that gunk of our your hair, Poindexter.”

Harry obediently shuffles into the bathroom, still not having the first clue why Zayn Malik has invited him over to his house for a shower. He’s only ever been in his own shower and it’s weird seeing all of Zayn’s unfamiliar stuff in here - his razor and sliver of soap and half-empty shampoo bottles and a wadded up washcloth stuffed in one corner of the tub.

Harry’s just conditioning his hair when Zayn barges in, kicking the door closed behind him. “Sorry man, gotta wee,” he apologizes before unzipping his flies.

Harry turns his body so it’s angled toward the wall while Zayn pees, trying to hide the unmistakable silhouette of his erection against the stippled glass door.

Zayn washes his hands at the sink and calls out, “nice arse,” to Harry over his shoulder as he waltzes out. Harry immediately yanks the tap to freezing cold, wincing as it strikes his overheated skin. But at least his dick goes down.

He feels excruciatingly self-conscious as he emerges from the bathroom, just a towel slung low over his hips. Zayn wolf-whistles appreciatively from his place on the bed and Harry has never been more glad to not be wearing his glasses, so he can’t see the expression on Zayn’s face. “Who knew you were hiding such a tight little body under all that Styles?”

Harry’s pretty sure his entire body blushes at the compliment. “Are you going to tell me why you just made me shower?”

“You’re coming out tonight and I need you to look respectable.”

“Oh, Zayn, I’m not sure-”

“It’s just to a footie game and for food afterward. You’ll be fine. I promise. I’ll even let you bring a book and if it gets too horribly boring, you can read, okay?”

“Yeh...yeah. okay...” Harry finally concedes. He sends a quick text to his mum, letting her know he won’t be home for dinner and swallows down whatever reservations he might have.

Somewhere between Zayn putting contact lenses in Harry’s eyes (turns out his mum’s an optician and that’s why he asked Harry about his prescription) and squeezing Harry into the tightest jeans known to man (jeans that prompted Harry to ask where his uh, you know - where it was supposed to go), Harry realizes they are actually going to a footie game. A footie game that Louis Tomlinson will be playing in. And that’s precisely when he starts to panic.

Harry’s never actually been to a footie game – what with all the popular kids there, it always seemed like putting a target on his back - but maybe with Zayn it will be all right. Although, when has anything in Harry’s life ever been all right?

When Zayn’s done, he stands Harry in front of the mirror and for a second, Harry can’t believe the person he’s looking at it is him. It’s like Zayn erased every trace of Marcel. Gone is the straight, perfectly coiffed hair. In its place, his messy, natural curls fall in a soft halo around his face. Gone are the giant magnifying glasses and you can actually see just how green his eyes are this way. Gone are the out of date sweater vest and corduroy trousers. In their place are sinfully tight black jeans that only seem to elongate his already freakishly long legs, a footie jersey that hugs every curve of his torso and a pair of black Converse that are just a smidge too tight on his oversized feet.

“Wow,” Harry whispers.

Zayn slaps Harry’s arse hard enough that he’s sure he’s going to feel it later. Harry winces, but thankfully Zayn doesn't notice. “Ready to go stud?”

Harry awkwardly shuffles out of the narrow bathroom and down the stairs after Zayn, trying to get used to his balls feeling like they’ve receded back into his body cavity. If Zayn’s sister’s reactions are anything to go by, he looks good. Doniya falls off the couch where she’s watching an episode of Eastenders and Waliyha walks straight into a wall with the bowl of cereal she’s carrying from the kitchen. In the kitchen, Saafa hides behind Trisha, her face bright red.

“Have a nice time, love,” Trisha says, patting Harry’s hair. “Make sure Zayn wears his helmet.” If high school were only made up of children and mums, Harry would be the most popular kid there.

Zayn rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling as his mum kisses his cheek and shoos them out the door into the night. There’s a chill in the air and on the ride over, Harry cements his body to Zayn’s back a little more closely than is probably strictly necessary.

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words. I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

Harry assumes they’ll sit in the stands like normal people, but Zayn insists they’ll get the best view on the pitch, and besides, Niall is equipment manager and, “he’s a right laugh. You’ll love him”. Besides the players and the coach, there’s just four of them on the sidelines - Niall, Amy, Zayn and Harry - all huddled together under the stadium lights against the biting wind. Harry misses the sensible sweater he was wearing earlier as his arms erupt into goose bumps and he feels self-conscious about the fact that everyone’s staring at him now. He’s grown used to being just an anonymous face in the crowd and all the sudden attention is overwhelming and completely unwarranted – he’s the same person he’s always been, just in different clothes.

True to Zayn’s word, Harry does love Niall. He’s generous and easy going and spends half the night with food hanging out of his maw as he doles out towels and water and encouragement to the players. Harry likes him straight away, especially when Niall disappears at some point and returns with two hot dogs - one for himself and one for Harry. Harry offers a bite to Zayn, but Zayn makes a face. “Don’t do mystery meat.”

His loss. The hot dog is savory and delicious and settles warmly in his stomach. Unfortunately, Harry manages to dribble mustard all down the front of the shirt Zayn lent him. Zayn rolls his eyes and shakes his head, but he has that soft, fond smile on his face that Harry’s only seen him give to his sisters. “Can’t take you anywhere, mate.”

Amy is great as well. Niall keeps referring to her as his “lady friend” but it’s clear he wants her to be more than a friend and Harry can easily see why. She’s gorgeous and just like his sister, Gemma, has a dry, acerbic wit that has Harry chortling to himself all night. Harry’s glad he gets along well with Niall and Amy because Zayn keeps disappearing to God knows where, returning with bruised lips and reeking of cigarette smoke. After one such trip during halftime, Zayn returns with a giant purpling love bite on his neck that Niall spends the rest of the game poking, until Zayn retaliates by twisting his nipple.

Harry’s having a great time all around. He feels like a different person - baptized in the incandescent light of the stadium lamps - like a new person. Deep down, he knows contact lenses and a wardrobe update won’t change anything - not really. He’s still Marcel and he’ll always be Marcel - a little bookish and nerdy and introverted - but for one night it feels kind of nice not to worry and to just be a stupid teenager - to just be Harry.

Harry isn’t exactly following what’s happening on the field, but his eyes do keep track of where Louis is on the field. Harry doesn’t know much about footie, but he knows enough to know that Louis is good - like really good. In some ways, though he’s seen Louis a thousand times before on campus, it’s like he’s never really seen him until tonight - how he glows under the lights, how he maneuvers his body like it was made for this. When Louis drives the ball down the field toward the opposing goal and sneaks it in just over the keeper’s shoulder, the home crowd explodes into applause and Harry’s chest swells with pride, although it really has no right to. It’s not like he and Louis are friends. It’s not like Louis even knows his name.

Still, when Louis is pulling faces at Niall and Zayn, when he catches Harry’s hand in a line of hands awaiting high fives along the sideline, it almost feels like, well, like Harry is Louis’ friend. And there is that moment too - that moment when Louis’ startlingly blue eyes meet Harry’s and time seems to still - the roaring of the crowd fading away into silence and everything but Louis receding into blurriness.

“Nice shirt, sweetheart,” Louis deadpans with a wink and a smirk, before running back into the fray.

Harry’s standing there in shock, wondering what the hell just happened, when Niall shoots him two thumbs up over Amy’s shoulder.

“What, why did he - what team is this for?” Harry blusters, glancing down at the shirt and back up at Niall. It’s just a plain white shirtwith a black seventeen on the front - nothing out of the ordinary as far as Harry is concerned.

Niall snorts, clapping Harry on the back. “You don’t know? You’re wearing Louis Tomlinson’s footie shirt, mate.”

Harry cranes his head over his shoulder and sure enough TOMLINSON is stretched across his shoulder blades in bold black lettering. So that’s it? That’s what tonight is all about? Zayn is trying to embarrass him? To humiliate Harry in front of his crush by making him look like a little fan girl?

Harry can’t help the angry, embarrassed tears that spring to his eyes as he turns and walks off along the sidelines. “Harry, where are you-?” he hears Niall call, but it’s drowned out by the sound of his own wet gasping and the jeers of the crowd as the opposing team scores a goal. Harry’s nearly made it to the gate when someone grabs his shoulder and spins him around, nearly throwing him off balance.

“Harry, are you leaving?” Zayn looks positively bewildered and it’s odd, because Harry’s never found Zayn’s face overtly expressive before. Most of the time, he alternates between a smoldering gaze and an amused smirk, in keeping with his whole mysterious, bad-boy air. But Harry’s starting to get the idea that the image Zayn works so hard to cultivate is just that - an image - that it’s not really Zayn at all. In fact, Harry has no idea who Zayn is.

“Really funny, Zayn. Seriously. A real riot,” Harry says, swiping angrily with the backs of his hands at his face. He hates people seeing him cry, especially near-strangers, but he feels gutted and he can’t stop the tears from rolling down his cheeks.

“Harry, what are you on about?” Zayn asks, his expression pained.

“You dressed me in Louis Tomlinson’s kit? Knowing I had a massive crush on him.So what - are Niall and Amy in on it too then? Is Louis? Oh God,” Harry covers his face with his hands, trying to take deep breaths. The last thing he needs is to have another asthma attack in the middle of the stadium, wearing Louis Tomlinson’s footie shirt for Christ’s sake.

“Harry – wait, what? You like Louis?” Zayn gapes.

Harry nods slowly, searching Zayn’s expression for some sign he’s taking the piss. Zayn is usually pretty good at keeping his face a mask of casual indifference, but right now, he looks wounded Harry would even suggest such a thing. “I swear – I had no idea. Louis left his shirt at mine and I figured it was sporty and since we were going to a match and all - Harry, I wouldn’t do that to you – I swear. You have to believe me.”

“Seriously?”

“If you want to switch shirts we can – or you can wear my jacket if you want –” Zayn starts to wriggle out of his leather jacket, but Harry shakes his head, letting out a shaky sigh. He feels stupid for crying, for overreacting, but after everything, he has a hard time trusting people.

“No, I’m fine. He’s already seen, sos-”

“Well, at least let me help you get the mustard off it,” Zayn groans, grabbing Harry by the belt-loop to tug him toward the toilets.

Judging by the way Perrie - the bubbly blonde from Harry’s Bio class - is hanging off of Zayn in the car parkafter the game, Harry’s thinks it’s safe to assume she’s the one who sucked the love bite into his neck during half-time. Harry likes Perrie - she always smiles at him and once even offered to be his partner for a project when he was glancing despondently around the room as the other students paired off.

Zayn’s playing it cool, but Harry doesn’t miss the blush that creeps up into his high cheekbones when Perrie squeals and plants a kiss on his cheek.

“You sure you’ll be okay riding with Niall?” Zayn asks for the millionth time, although Perrie is already wearing the helmet, so Harry’s pretty sure it’s a moot point. It looks better on her anyway.

“Yeah.” Harry awkwardly shuffles his feet, feeling the pinch of his too-tight borrowed shoes. “I’ll catch up with you guys at the restaurant.”

“Great. Thanks,” Zayn reaches over and ruffles Harry’s hair affectionately as he starts his bike up. “See ya.”

Zayn skirts around the queue of cars lined up to exit the lot and zips out onto the road before Harry can change his mind. He’s left standing – abandoned – in the car park, wearing Louis Tomlinson’s football shirt of all things. What is his life even?

Just when Harry’s about to begin the long trudge home (he can apologize to Zayn later for not showing up to dinner - it’s not like anyone will miss him anyway) Niall comes up behind him, slinging an arm around his neck.

“Hear you’re with me then?” Something relaxes within Harry’s gut in Niall’s presence and he can’t help but return the blond boy’s smile.

Twenty minutes later, Harry’s in the backseat of Niall’s car with his arms crossed, watching Louis Tomlinson and Eleanor Calder suck face against her car, a cute sporty convertible thing that probably costs more than Harry’s mum earns in a year. Amy’s up front with Niall, fiddling with the radio and Harry’s stuck wedged in the back next to Liam Payne and Stan Lucas, all of them waiting for Louis to disengage his tongue from Eleanor’s throat and remove the hand he has shoved under her short skirt.

Harry wants to look away - besides being shameless and sort of gross going at it like this in public, it makes him have a horrible plummeting feeling in his stomach - but he doesn’t want to miss the opportunity to see what Louis looks like kissing someone since he’ll likely never get the chance.

“They’re really going at it, huh?” Niall comments, rolling down the window to shout something that’s meant to be a threat of bodily harm, but sounds vaguely chipper in his Irish brogue. Eleanor releases Louis with a roll of her eyes, taking her gum back from his mouth and popping it into hers in the most disgusting display of PDA Harry’s ever witnessed. No, wait, Louis grinning and wiping his fingers off on his jeans as he heads back to the car is the most disgusting thing he’s ever witnessed.

Louis takes all of three seconds to assess the backseat situation before planting his arse down right in Harry’s lap. Harry grunts in response, fingernails digging a frantic SOS into the upholstery.

“All sorted then?” Niall asks, not waiting for an answer before peeling out of the lot (which emptied out considerably since Zayn left). And no, Harry is not all sorted. He’s the least sorted he’s ever been. Louis Tomlinson’s legendary bum is seated on his crotch and Harry has a face full of his shower-wet hair, smelling of whatever shampoo Louis uses. Harry’s trying desperately, desperately to think of something else - the quadratic equation or baby kittens playing with a ball of yarn - anything else but the solid press of Louis’ ample bum against his dick.

Stan provides a welcome distraction, trying to reach around Liam to grab Louis’ hand. “Come on. Be a lad. Give us a sniff.”

Louis laughs riotously, clutching his hand to his chest and feigning an appalled expression, as if he wasn’t shamelessly fingering his girlfriend in front of them only moments ago. Liam gets involved trying to keep Stan on his side of the car and Niall provides hilarious commentary while Amy tries to drown them all out with music.

Meanwhile, Louis is squirming in Harry’s lap in an attempt to get away from Stan and Harry pinches his own thigh hard enough to leave a bruise, willing his body to behave for once in his stupid life. You’d think the tight pants would be enough to deter him from getting hard, but all they do is make it even more evident once he does. As his dick fills with blood, it’s forced down the left leg of his jeans, outlined in sordid detail. Though it’s more than a little uncomfortable and painful having his hard-on bowed in the wrong direction, Harry doesn’t dare try to adjust himself and alert Louis to his growing problem. Not that Louis doesn’t eventually catch on.

Harry realizes the exact second Louis does because the boy abruptly stops moving on his lap and snaps at Stan to stop, no longer any playfulness in his voice. Stan pouts, folding his arms and gazing out the opposite window, and Liam slumps back into his seat, relieved he can stop playing referee.

Amy’s found a good song on the radio at last and while everyone is singing along and otherwise distracted, Louis leans back against Harry’s chest, mouth brushing wetly against his ear. “All right mate?” he asks in a voice so soft and low it sends chills ice-skating down Harry’s back.

“Sorry, I-” Harry prattles, feeling like he’s going to puke.

“Is this going to be a thing with you then?” Louis teases. As if Harry needs reminding that this is the second hard-on he’s had in front of Louis Tomlinson.

The rest of the car ride is painfully long. At first Harry thinks it’s just the car’s failing shocks or all the potholes and speed bumps Niall seems to purposefully run over at a clip, but after a mile or two, Harry realizes Louis is deliberately grinding his bum back into Harry’s crotch.Harry has no idea what to make of it - he doesn’t know if Louis is just trying to tease him or if he just finds it amusing - but Harry’s pretty sure if they don’t get to the restaurant soon, he’s going to make a mess in his trousers.

“Louis, please - please stop,” Harry croaks pathetically, holding Louis’ narrow hips in place. Harry’s hands span nearly Louis’ whole waist and the thought of what they would look like all over Louis’ body springs to Harry’s mind and refuses to go away. Louis has always had such a big personality that Harry really never noticed how tiny he actually is and now that he has he can’t stop noticing.

Louis finally relents and takes mercy on him, but it doesn’t help matters much. By the time they’ve reached the restaurant, Harry’s still got a full-blown hard-on. He no longer feels on the verge of org*sm, but he knows that the moment he steps out of the car everyone will notice, so he waits for everyone else to pile out first, keeping Louis firmly affixed to his lap. He’s only prolonging the inevitable humiliation, but he doesn’t see a whole lot of other options.

“I can’t stay here all night, you know,” Louis says in a tetchy voice.

“I just - need a minute or two,” Harry trembles.

“Sorry to say – but that thing is not going anywhere in a minute,” Louis snorts.

“Well, what do you suggest?” Harry snaps. It’s partly Louis’ fault he’s so worked up to begin with.

Louis bends over to grab his duffle bag, which is resting over their feet. Harry hears the bag unzip and rezip and Louis reemerges with a gray hoodie, which he shoves at Harry’s chest. “Here. Put this on. Since you seem so fond of wearing of wearing my clothes anyway.”

Harry tries to sputter a response, but it’s lost inside the hoodie as he drags it over his head, pulling it down low enough to cover his situation. When Louis slides off of his lap, Harry quickly shoves his hand down his jeans and re-adjusts so he’s pointed due north. Louis smirks when he lets out a sigh of relief, hopping spryly out of the car onto the curb.

By the time they walk into the restaurant, everyone’s already seated at a long row of tables in the back. There’s only two empty chairs right next to each other and Harry realizes he’ll have to sit next to Louis all through dinner. With a giant boner. While wearing his shirt, well, two of his shirts. Which is just great.

Eleanor glances up at their approach, frowning when she sees Harry. “Groupies sit over there,” she says snidely, loud enough for the whole table to hear, pointing to a table of giggling Year 7snearby. Everyone at the table goes dead silent, gazing furtively back and forth between Eleanor and Harry.

Harry’s face burns with embarrassment and he’s not sure if he should attempt to sit with them or just go hide in the toilets for the rest of the night. Eleanor’s part of their group and she has more right to be here than he does - she’s just the only one brave enough to say it.

Zayn looks on the verge of saying something when Louis snaps, “Oh, come off it, El,” flopping dramatically into the chair next to Liam. Eleanor’s eyes go wide and everyone else at the table takes a sudden vested interest in their menus. Harry sits down as quietly and unobtrusively as he can manage with ten people shooting cloaked glances at him from behind their menus.

When Louis and Harry have their faces behind their own menus, Louis side whispers, “Have you got a name or shall I just call you Boner Boy?”

Harry blushes hard. “Harry. Harry Styles.”

“Right, Harry. I’d tell you mine, but if you forget, you can just look at the back of your shirt,” Louis teases. Harry shrinks down into his seat, wondering just what Zayn got him into.

The waitress comes round after a few minutes, brandishing a pad and pen and the put-on smile of someone who’s been working a long, thankless shift. “Hi. I’m Samantha. I’ll be your server this evening. Can I start you off with some drinks?”

“I’m famished. I’ll have a co*ke and the Burger Royale with Cheese and Chips,” Louis says, closing his menu and handing it to the waitress with such a charming smile she actually gets her a little flustered.

“He’ll have the House Salad with dressing on the side and a Diet co*ke.” Eleanor interjects. When Louis gives her a questioning glance, she pouts and adds, “you’re getting a little pudgy, babe.”

The waitress looks back and forth between the two of them, clearly unsure which order to take, and Louis lets out a defeated little sigh, sinking down into his seat like he wants to disappear. It’s a look Harry’s never seen on Louis - humiliated and hurt. The footballer is normally so co*cky and confident, but his normally playful smile is gone and his next words sound like they’re wrung out of him. “Yeah, the salad. What she said.”

Harry’s horrified by the exchange - Louis is nowhere near fat and even if he was, who cares? Louis would look great no matter how much he weighed. He looks great now. And after expending as much energy as he had on the field, he has every right to eat a burger.

Harry’s so put off he doesn’t catch on that the waitress has asked him his own order until he realizes everyone is staring at him. “I’ll um - I’ll have the Classic burger with Chips and a strawberry milkshake.”

Chatter starts up again after the waitress leaves, but it’s more subdued than before and Louis and Eleanor are both stonily silent. Louis is looking down at the tablecloth so hard, Harry’s pretty sure it’s going to ignite and Eleanor is quietly examining her manicure and pointedly avoiding the glances of her tablemates. Niall looks furious and Zayn looks like he’s biting his tongue, but the rest of them are treating the exchange like it’s a thing that happens on the regular. Harry can’t believe not one of Louis’ so-called friends stood up for him.

Their food comes and despite having said he was famished, Louis idly pushes his salad back and forth with his fork. Harry watches him, feeling his gut twist into knots. He’s seen Louis triumphant and joking and cheeky, but never sad and it cuts him to the core. Before he knows what he’s doing, Harry is cutting his hamburger in half and sliding his plate closer to Louis. “Hey, I’m not going to eat all of this. Did you want half?”

“Are you sure?” Louis asks, shooting an apprehensive glance over at Eleanor. She’s lost in a conversation with Danielle though and hasn’t taken any notice of them.

“Yeah. Niall stuffed me full of hot dogs earlier,” he says, giving Louis an encouraging smile. Louis doesn’t wait before globbing ketchup all over his half of the burger. His eyes flutter shut when he takes his first bite and he makes an obscene sound in the back of his throat that makes Harry’s dick twitch with renewed interest. Eleanor stops her conversation to glare at him.

Louis polishes off half of Harry’s burger and most of his chipsand by the time he’s sipping on the dregs of Harry’s milkshake, he’s in a much better mood, joking and laughing with Liam and re-enacting the final plays of the match (which they’d won thanks to him). Harry’s slowly working on a few chips, but mostly he’s enjoying the way Louis’ eyes crinkle up at the corners when he laughs. When Louis looks over at him, he smirks.

“Mate, you’re a mess - you’ve got ketchup-” Louis gestures vaguely to his whole face. Harry swipes his tongue around his mouth, but somehow manages to miss the spot because Louis rolls his eyes impatiently and reaches over without thinking. Louis brushes his thumb over one corner of Harry’s mouth and along the curve of his bottom lip, lingering just a moment too long, long enough for Harry to taste the salt on his skin. Harry shivers as their eyes meet and Louis quickly withdraws his hand.

“Got it,” he says in a choked whisper, looking down at his own lap to avoid Harry’s eyes. Harry’s so stunned he nearly misses it when Louis brings the thumb he’s just touched Harry’s mouth with up to his own mouth to suck the ketchup off.

When Harry wakes up Saturday morning, he’s never been more glad to be in his own bed in his own clothes (mostly), wearing his old familiar, taped-up glasses. He doesn’t have anything left from his childhood - no pictures or toys or baby clothes or mementos - nothing from the past to cling to when he wants to escape his current life. What he has are books and the shell he’s built around himself to keep everyone else out. There are tiny cracks in it now, but he tries not to notice them - tries to pay no mind to the odd, quavering shaft of light they let in. He tries not to get used to it because he knows how quickly things can change.

It was nice to be someone else for a day, but right now all he wants to do is curl up, with a good book and a cuppa and forget the look of pure bliss on Louis Tomlinson’s face when he bit into his burger the previous evening. (It’d be a whole lot easier to forget if he wasn’t wearing Louis Tomlinson’s hoodie, but he’s only human.)

Last night was a window onto what Harry’s life might have been, had things been different, and having to go back to normal life hurts more than he imagined it would.

It wasn’t always this way. Once, Harry had been a normal kid, who had mates like every other kid. Once, he wouldn’t think twice about someone inviting him to a footie game or to go ride bikes around the neighborhood or down to the corner shop to buy sweets. Once, he’d taken for granted that he would always have enough to eat, that he would have clothes that didn’t come already smelling of someone else, that he would have his own room. Once, he had trusted that his parents knew what was right for him, that they would never hurt him or let anyone else hurt him no matter what. But then the Bad Thing happened and his life was never the same again.

Harry pulls his blankets more tightly around him, trying to fight the chill that prickles his skin. He still remembers the cold, miserable winter they moved to Holmes Chapel - remembers the billowing clouds of dust and quiet spaces left behind by his Gran, remembers the little square marks in the carpet where her furniture had once been, the stray hairpin or button he’d find in the back of the closet or in the medicine cabinet. These things were all that was left of the grandmother he’d never known and it seemed oddly fitting that her final legacy should be silence. Moving into her home, into the place Harry’s mother had grown up in and vowed never to return to, felt vaguely like landing on the moon.

His mum had insisted on painting all the rooms bright, cheery colors - a fresh start she had said, shooting a quick, worried glance in Harry’s direction - but Harry knew what she was really doing - trying to erase their old life, trying to eradicate any traces of the past. Harry didn’t blame her. He wanted to draw a line through that day - that day his whole life had changed - and never look back. If only it was so easy as a fresh coat of paint.

Back then, Harry still believed in second chances, in do-overs. So even though the kids at his new school picked on him - made fun of his slow manner of speaking and his giant glasses and his charity shop clothes - he thought maybe it wouldn’t always be that way. Which is why he’d spent a week before Valentines Day, staying up way past his bedtime, hand-making thirty-seven individual Valentines for his Year 3 classmates.

He still remembers the morning they opened the little letterboxes at their desks, the excited shouts around him as his classmates pulled out cards and sweetsand little trinkets and the horrible sinking feeling in his own stomach when he looked into his own box and saw only two thin sheaves of paper at the bottom. One was a card from his teacher - who had given a card to everyone in the class and one was a card from…

Harry lets himself do something he hasn’t done in a long time and digs out the shoebox from under his bed, resting it across his knees as he lifts the lid. He picks the card up by its edges, the paper brittle and faded with time. It was just a store-bought thing, nothing special, not like the cards he had slaved over all week. Just a cat with a little speech bubble saying: “You’re purrrrfect to me,” but it meant more to Harry than any single one of his possessions. He runs his thumb over the signature at the bottom of the card, the lump growing in his throat. He just wants to know why -

A soft knock at his door jolts him from his reverie and he throws the card back into the box and shoves it under his pillow. “Marcel? You awake love?” his mother asks through the door.

“Come in.” Harry’s voice is slightly high-pitched, slightly wrong in his mouth, but his mum must not catch on because she’s smiling when she comes in, carrying a tray with a mug of tea and a plate of biscuits.

“Thought you might want some tea.” She sets the tray down with a ceramic rattle on his bedside table and he slides over, making room for her on the bed. She pats his thigh as she sits. “Did you have a nice time with your friends last night?”

“Mum, they’re not-”

“It’s good to see you going out again,” she cuts him off. “You know, I ran into Jay Tomlinson at the supermarket this week-”

“Oh?” Harry tries to keep his tone normal, conversational, but his mind is racing through possible scenarios.

“Yeah. We got to talking and she asked for your number. I hope you don’t mind that I gave it to her. She said you were so good with her girls and I said you wouldn’t mind a little spending cash - I mean, you don’t have to, but it might be nice.”

“What might be nice?”

“Babysitting? But only if you want. Don’t feel obligated or anything and if you have plans with your friends - ”

Harry’s about to reiterate that he doesn’t have any friends, when his mobile buzzes on the bedside table. “I’ll leave you to it then,” his mum smiles as he picks it up.

Harry shifts his reusable shopping bags over to one hip so he can knock on the Tomlinson’s front door. His stomach feels like it’s performing an exorcism as he waits, half hoping that Louis will answer and half hoping that anyone but Louis will answer. Jay emerges five minutes later, looping a pearl earring through her earlobe. “Oh, come on in love,” she waves him in with a big smile. “Thanks so much for doing this. I know it’s last minute, but Louis has that party and Mark just sprung this on me -”

Harry follows Jay into the house as she works her hair into a complicated French twist and crucifies it with bobby pins. “The girls haven’t eaten yet, but I’ve left money for pizza-”

“Oh, that’s okay.” Harry sets his bags down on the center island in the kitchen. “I brought stuff to cook. If that’s okay?”

“Oh, your mother must love you,” Jay gushes. “I can’t get Louis to even make his own lunch.” Harry blushes at the mention of Louis’ name, but busies himself putting the ingredients for dinner into the fridge. He’s not here for Louis - he’s not even going to think about Louis - of Louis in only a pair of joggers, with sleep-rumpled hair, standing in a rectangle of yellow light in front of the fridge late one night, rooting around for something to eat. Harry slams the door on the thought. He’s just doing Jay a favor. That’s all.

“Lottie can take her own bath and don’t worry about Fizzy, but you’ll have to give the twins theirs,” Jay explains. “Their bedtime is normally eight, but you can keep them up until nine thirty since it’s the weekend.” Jay leans on the counter, looking at Harry properly for the first time since he arrived. Despite her careful makeup and perfectly tailored black dress, she looks harried and exhausted.

“Fizzy’s just had her chemo so she’s been feeling poorly. She’ll probably stay in bed most of the evening, but if you could just check on her every so often and make sure she’s getting enough fluids? She threw up this morning, but she was able to keep some digestives down at lunch, so have her try and eat a little something.”

Harry nods as he tries to take it all in. He had no idea Louis’ sister was sick. The previous year, their school had held some sort of charity match to raise money for a bone marrow transplant for a little girl with leukemia - Harry remembers slipping some notes into the canister in the front office - but he never goes (or used to go) to matches and he’d no idea it was for Louis’ sister. Knowing makes his body ache all over and he has to lean against the counter to keep his legs from collapsing beneath him.

Jay buries her face in her hands. “Maybe I shouldn’t go - I just - I don’t like leaving them. I know I should get used to it - because Louis will be off to Uni in a year - but I just feel so guilty...”

Harry puts a hand on Jay’s arm, giving her what he hopes is a reassuring smile. “It’s okay. I’ve got them. You go and have fun.”

“You’re right. I haven’t had a night out in ages. Okay - the emergency number’s are on the fridge. Mark and I will be in London overnight, but you can leave whenever Louis gets back.” Jay straightens her dress. “Right, anything else?”

“I think that about covers it.” Jay throws her arms around Harry in a quick, tight hug, engulfing him in a cloud of perfume and hairspray. “I really can’t thank you enough. You’re a lifesaver.”

“The girls will be fine,” Harry assures her just as the twins peek around the doorway into the kitchen. Daisy immediately cements herself to Harry’s leg and when he starts walking with her still clinging to him, Phoebe finds it hilarious and grasps on to his other leg.

Louis’ dad comes down the stairs a few minutes later, fumbling with his tie, which Jay helps him straighten. Jay introduces Harry to Mark before they’re both out the door and Harry’s alone - well, sort of alone - in Louis Tomlinson’s house.

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

The thing is - Harry actually really likes kids - and Louis’ sisters are no exception. They’re bright and inquisitive and funny without meaning to be. Lottie’s twelve and at that awkward age on the cusp of childhood and adolescence. She spends the beginning of the night with her eyes glued to her mobile, until Harry hands her a cheese grater and a block of mozzarella and puts her to work. He manages to coax a smile or two out of her to boot, which he considers no small success, when you factor in both her age and that she seems shy about smiling with braces. Fizzy spends most of the night in her room, but shuffles downstairs in a towering mound of blankets to watch telly on the sofa and attempt to eat a bit. The others all gravitate toward her, giving her snuggles when they can and if it makes Harry tear up a bit, well, there’s no one there to see.

The twins are four-year-old blonde bundles of mischief and much more Harry’s speed; they’re not at an age yet that they care about his giant glasses or his dorky clothes. In fact, they seem to be under the mistaken impression that he’s sort of - well - sort of cool. They try on his glasses and want to know about the books he’s read and his favorite movie. They nod approvingly when he says his favorite color is green and his favorite animal is a turtle. They act like he’s a wizard when he takes out ingredients for mini pizzas (they’ve only ever had restaurant pizza and find the idea that you can make it at home the closest possible thing to magic).

Harry patiently shows them how to knead the dough and add sauce and soft, shredded mozzarella (courtesy of Lottie) and insists they pick at least one vegetable topping. The final results are a little misshapen, but delicious nonetheless. Harry even manages to get Fizzy to eat a few bites (which she promptly throws up). She seems to fare better with a cherry lolly and it helps combat some of the nausea so she’s able to play with them for a bit. Harry does his best to make Fizzy feel included because he knows how miserable it can be to be stuck in bed while everyone else is having fun.

After dinner, they make chocolate chip cookies from scratch and while they’re in the oven, he and the girls fingerpaint in the back garden (wearing some of Harry’s old dress shirts as smocks so they don’t ruin their clothes). Harry lets them have two cookies each once they’ve cooled and then he gives Daisy and Phoebe a bath to get the marinara sauce and flour and paint out of their fine blond hair. (He has a good deal of gunk in his own hair, but figures he’ll take a shower once he’s home.)

By eight o’clock, the twins are in their pajamas and valiantly fighting back yawns. Daisy insists they watch Tangled for what Harry gathers is the millionth time (the others all groan when she suggests it) though Harry thinks they secretly don’t mind. Louis is the only one with a television in his room, so they all pile into his bed to watch. Harry’s not sure it’s okay at first, but Lottie insists that Louis lets them “all the time” and Fizzy seems to perk up a bit at the suggestion so he doesn’t have the heart to say no.

Louis’ bed smells distressingly like his cologne, overlaid with the strawberry scent of the girl’s shampoo, and as they all pile around him and the movie starts, Harry promises himself he won’t make a habit of this.

Harry jerks awake sometime later to the sound of voices in the outside corridor. It’s the loud sort of whispering drunk people do when they’re trying to be quiet that isn’t quiet at all because they’re having trouble modulating their volume. There’s a fair bit of stumbling as well followed by a loud crash and a bout of uncontrollable giggling. Harry slowly peers around the unfamiliar room, taking a moment to remember where he is and why he’s there. The DVD is back on the title menu and the blinking clock on the player says 2 AM. Harry has one twin on his chest and another wedged into his armpit and Fizzy and Lottie are snuggled one to each side of him. Right. Babysitting.

He spots Louis’ grass-stained football shirt slung over the back of his computer chair and his stomach suddenly feels like it’s trying to twist itself into an origami crane. Right. He’s in Louis’ bed. Again. Harry’s still trying to figure out how to extricate himself from the pile of glossy blonde hair and body heat sinking him into the mattress when the door bangs open and Louis and Eleanor stumble in.

Eleanor’s clinging to Louis as she totters drunkenly on her heels, tugging self-consciously at her short dress as it rides up. She manages to pull Louis’ shirt over his head, but not without stumbling into his desk first and knocking a pile of his homework onto the floor. They’re both laughing into their kisses as she rubs at her bruised hip and Louis slides a hand up her body to roughly cup one of her breasts. Harry feels vaguely sick. The lights are still off and Louis hasn’t yet noticed that anyone else is in the room, which is probably why he thinks nothing of pushing Eleanor up against the wall, rattling a framed picture of the Doncaster Rovers over his desk. Louis growls as he presses the line of his body against Eleanor’s and nips at her alcohol swollen mouth.

Harry’s face goes hot and he clears his throat as discreetly as possible. Eleanor and Louis immediately startle apart, like two opposing magnets. The light snaps on a second later and Louis is staring at Harry like he just caught him robbing the place.

“Er, um-” Harry struggles for an explanation.

“What are you doing here?” Louis asks, the accusation sharp in his voice.

Harry’s face burns in mortification. “Uh - the girls don’t have a television in their room and they said it would be okay if we -”

“I don’t mean in my room,” Louis snaps, picking up his discarded shirt and holding it in front of his bare chest self-consciously. He needn’t do. He looks well fit from where Harry is sitting. “I mean, here. In my house.”

“Your mum asked me to babysit. I thought - she said she told you -” For a long moment, they just stare at each other, while Harry tries to recall how exactly to set his limbs into motion.

“Well?” Louis huffs finally, crossing his arms. “Do you mind getting out?”

Eleanor’s making a pointed effort not to look at Harry, which is just as well. It’s not like he doesn’t know what he interrupted.

Lottie stirs when Harry gently shakes her shoulder and mumbles goodnight and gives him a bungled kiss on the edge of his ear before trudging off to her room. Harry gently slides his arms under Fizzy, her body burning like a furnace against his chest. While Eleanor busies herself with her phone, Louis hoists a twin onto each hip with practiced ease. Harry has only a minute to admire the gentle way Louis is cradling his sisters, their blonde heads tucked into each side of his neck, small hands fisted into the back of his shirt, before Louis disappears into the bedroom down the hall.

Fizzy’s awake by the time Harry sets her down in bed, her big blue eyes fever bright and face worryingly glazed with sweat. “I don’t feel so well,” she says in a small voice, before projectile vomiting all down the front of Harry’s shirt. The smell of sick is cloying and Harry fights the urge to be sick himself as he grabs up a handful of tissues from the bedside table, futilely mopping at his shirt.

"I’m so sorry,” Fizzy cries weakly, tears spilling miserably down her flushed cheeks.

Harry gives her an empathetic smile as he rubs her back through her sweat-soaked night-shirt. “It’s all right. I’m not cross. Let’s get you cleaned up.” Harry strips off his clothes and Fizzy’s nightgown, wadding them up inside the soiled sheets. He finds a clean jumper and a pair of Louis’ joggers hanging in the laundry room when he’s putting the sheets into the washing machine and tries not to think about it too much as he pulls them on. The joggers are a bit short, exposing a good three inches of ankle and the jumper is tight across his chest, but they’ll do in a pinch. And it’s not like Harry’s making a habit of wearing Louis’ clothes.

When he gets back, Fizzy is curled up on the carpet in just her pants, clutching her stomach, but she hasn’t thrown up any in his absence, which he takes as a good sign. Harry draws a cold bath to help bring down her fever because he remembers his mum doing that when he was poorly. The ten year old is limp and heavy when he lifts her up, barely responsive when he lowers her into the cool water and gently mops the sick from her chest and hair with a damp flannel.

He pulls her out of the tub when she starts shivering and dries her off and dresses her in clean pajamas. Lottie helps him to stretch fresh sheets onto the bed and Harry lays with Fizzy, on top of the covers, reading her a chapter from Harry Potter. She clings to him as she falls into a fitful sleep, whimpering every so often into his jumper (well, Louis’ jumper). Lottie’s already asleep in her own bed, one arm thrown across her face as she softly snores. Harry’s exhausted - wants nothing more than to close his eyes, just for a minute - but that’s precisely when Louis’ headboard starts thumping against the adjoining wall and Eleanor’s reedy moans join the chorus of things Harry could have gone through his life without hearing.

He sighs, letting his head fall back onto Fizzy’s Little Mermaid pillow with a thump. As horrible as it is listening to his crush have sex with his girlfriend through the wall, he really doesn’t have anywhere else to be. On a normal Saturday night, he would just be in his room, catching up on whatever books he had out from the library that week. Alma always tucks Post-it notes into the pages, tagging her favorite passages or making humorous asides and he saves them all in the shoebox under his bed with the Valentine and several other things he can’t bring himself to throw away. (He’s fairly sentimental for someone who’s spent half his life avoiding thinking about the past.)

Even though reading is a largely solitary activity, the little slips of paper Alma leaves make Harry feel less alone, make him feel connected to something larger than himself. He thinks of all the hands the books have passed through over the years, all the eyes that have pored over the same words his eyes pore over, and he feels like maybe there is a world out there where he belongs. He just hasn’t found it yet.

Harry’s been so wrapped up in books, he’s forgotten what it feels like to be needed. It’s been a long time since he’s felt remotely useful - long enough that he’s forgotten how good it feels to help someone who can’t help themselves. When Fizzy’s temperature still hasn’t come down an hour later and the headboard beginsits second aggressive staccato beat against the adjoining wall (Harry takes a strange sort of pride in Louis’ stamina), Harry decides he’s had enough. Fizzy’s temperature has been steadily at 40 degrees for an hour and the cold bath hadn’t helped any and the cool flannels he’s pressing to her face all night only seem to make her hair wet. He knows what he has to do, but that doesn’t make it any easier.

Harry knocks timidly on Louis’ door, wishing he could melt into a puddle and the carpet fibers would absorb him, soaking him up like a stain. That’s all he is in Louis’ life - a stain, an annoyance - and that’s all he’ll ever be. It’s high time he stopped living in his own fantasy world - where a beautiful person like Louis could love a homely boy like him - where anyone could love someone like him. The best he’ll ever be is tolerated.

“Louis?” Harry asks meekly, voice cracking on the word. The squeaking of the bedsprings halts abruptly and Eleanor makes an annoyed whine that sets Harry’s teeth on edge. Harry rests his forehead against the doorframe, heart racing. His mouth has gone dry and his palms are sweating and he has to keep reminding himself that it’s not about him right now, that Fizzy needs him. And that’s what finally gives him the courage to speak again. “Louis - please?”

When Louis finally opens the door, he’s sweaty and disheveled, mouth swollen and cheeks and chest flushed an alluring shade of red. He’s pulled on a pair of jogging bottoms, but they’re doing nothing to disguise his obvious erection and Harry’s stomach swoops at the sight of him. He’s had a love affair with words his whole life, but at the moment, Harry can’t think of a single one that would suffice. It’s like his head’s been shaken blank like an etch-a-sketch.

“Christ. What?” Louis demands. Eleanor’s sat up in bed behind him, clutching Louis’ sheets to her chest, shooting Harry a look so withering he’s almost nostalgic for the times she was content to ignore him.

But far worse than that is the look Louis is giving him. Unlike some of his twat friends - Louis has never looked at Harry that way - like a piece of dog sh*t stuck to the bottom of his shoe and it makes Harry want to curl up and die.

Louis annoyed expression softens when he sees the obvious worry on Harry’s face. “I’m so sorry - I - Fizzy’s ill - I think - I think we should take her to hospital - ” Harry mumbles. Something changes in Louis’ expression, a calm decisiveness taking place of his earlier indignation.

“Right. Just give me a minute, okay?” Louis closes the door to put some clothes on and Harry hears him and El arguing, voices muffled through the thick wood of the door. He knows he should go back and get Fizzy, but for a moment, he’s frozen to the spot.

“You can’t be serious,” he hears her say.

“El - I’m sorry. Can you just keep an eye on the girls until I get back?” Louis pleads.

“Why doesn’t Marcel keep an eye on them? Isn’t that like his job?” Harry stiffens hearing his old name spoken in Eleanor’s voice. It sounds vaguely like a curse in her mouth.

“Just bloody well leave it,” Louis snaps.

"You always side with him - you always-”

Harry shakes himself out of his trance and forces his legs to walk back to Fizzy and Lottie’s room, pressing his hands together to keep them from shaking. He bundles Fizzy up in a blanket and takes her downstairs to wait for Louis. She cries weakly as she moves in and out of fevered dreams and Harry strokes her hair and back as he paces the living room.

When Louis comes down, he’s thrown on an oversized white jumper and pulled a gray beanie over his sweaty hair and tucked his feet into shoes, but he still reeks of sex and dimly of alcohol, though he assures Harry he’s well enough to drive. He at least has the decency to look vaguely apologetic as he grabs his jacket and keys.

Harry and Louis don’t speak a word for the beginning of the drive. Louis’ body is stiff and angled forward over the wheel as he focuses intently on the road and Harry does his best to keep Fizzy as comfortable as possible. Harry shoots a few concerned glances in Louis’ direction, the other boy’s face tight with worry, but he doesn’t know what to say. This is Louis’ reality, not his, and every word of comfort he has would sound trite or insufficient, given the situation.

Fizzy stirs from sleep in the middle of the drive, gazing up at Harry with a glassy, unfocused look in her eyes. “Will you sing me something?” she asks in a small voice that makes his heart break a little. No child should have to deal with this sort of thing, especially not one as sweet as Fizzy.

“Harry, you don’t have to-” Louis begins, trying to give Harry an easy out..

Harry shakes his head, smiling down at the little girl bundled in his arms. He tries to forget Louis is in the car at all and focus his attention purely on Fizzy and once he’s singing it’s surprisingly easy. He gets lost in it, like a good book. Gets lost in the sleepy little smile on her face. “Isn’t she lovely?” he croons. “Isn’t she wonderful? Isn’t she precious? Less than one minute old...”

When he’s done singing, Fizzy gives Harry a vague pat on his hair and lets her head loll back against his chest, eyes fluttering closed once more. Harry makes the mistake of looking up at Louis then. Louis is staring at him with such an intense expression of unmitigated awe that Harry has to force his gaze away to the window as his face heats up. A minute passes, and then two, and time seems weighted in a way it hadn’t before, like lowly gathering rain-clouds before a storm.

“You’re a really great singer,” Louis says at last, breaking the silence.

“S’no big deal,” Harry mumbles, picking at a loose thread on the hem of his jumper before he remembers it’s Louis’ jumper he’s unraveling and abruptly stills his hand.

“I’m being serious. You should try out for X-Factor or something-” Louis continues, his eyes back on the road.

Harry lets out a snorting laugh. “‘M not that good.”

Louis shrugs. “You never know until you try. Is that what you want to do - after uni?”

“Haven’t thought of it much honestly,” Harry admits. “I’d be happy just to make it through college. How about you?”

Louis shrugs. “I’d like to be an actor or a footballer, but I’ll probably just teach. You know that old saying - those who can’t do, teach.” Harry nods at Louis, though he secretly thinks he’s wrong - Louis is a brilliant footie player and a great actor (or so he’s heard, he’s never actually been to any of the plays) - and Harry’s pretty sure Louis could do anything if he set his mind to it.

They lapse back into silence for the rest of the ride, but it’s not uncomfortable the way it was before, and Harry feels almost sorry when Louis pulls into the ambulance bay and lets them out while he goes to find parking.

Three hours later, when Jay and Mark finally arrive, Fizzy’s fever’s come down and Louis is slumped against Harry’s shoulder, asleep, beside her bed. Louis’ parents are still dressed as they were when they left for London, having come straight to the hospital from the theatre when Louis called, and they look wholly out of place in the tiny hospital room.

Jay immediately goes to hug Louis and Harry forces his gaze away to the window, not wanting to eavesdrop on the private moment.

“How is she?” he hears Jay exhale fiercely into Louis’ neck.

“Better,” Louis assures her, and when he thinks Harry’s sufficiently out of earshot, lowers his voice to add: “Harry’s been really great actually.”

Harry’s skin burns at the compliment, but luckily Mark is too busy digging in his billfold to notice. He hands Harry a handful of notes that looks like way too much money. “Oh, no, I couldn’t - ” Harry objects, but Mark shakes his head.

“I insist. You’ve earned it.” Mark presses the notes into Harry’s hand and Harry pockets it without counting it, embarrassed but grateful for their generosity. It’s not much in the grand scheme of things, but it will go a long way toward paying off his mum’s bills. “I’m sorry you had a rocky night. I’m just glad you and Louis were there for her.”

“Yeah.”

Jay still has an arm around Louis’ shoulders, like she’s reluctant to let go of him, but Mark sees Harry yawning and takes pity on them both. “Lou, we’ve got it from here. Why don’t you take Harry home and you can both get some sleep?”

“Are you sure?” Louis asks skeptically.

“Of course.” Louis’ mum gives him a final hug and then surprises Harry by giving him one as well. “Thanks so much,” she whispers into his hair and Harry’s heart feels lighter in his chest as they head out to car park.

They’re both too tired to make small talk on the way home and Harry rests his head against the window, drawing a heart into the condensation his breath leaves on the glass, before erasing it with his sleeve.

When Louis speaks at last, his voice is so soft and low it’s almost lost in the hush of the road passing by under the car’s tyres. “What happened to you?” Harry looks over at Louis curiously, but Louis is looking straight ahead, face set in profile. The head light’s sweep the blackness ahead as if they’re searching for something and the car is eerily silent.

“What do you mean?”

“To your...legs - the scars - who did that to you?” Louis asks, a bit breathlessly, as if he’s surprised by his own brazenness.

Harry stares at him. He never thought Louis noticed him or cared one way or another what happened to him. “How did you know about that?” he asks trepidatiously.

“That day - with Liam - I was the one who undressed you - Did - did someone hurt you?”

Harry’s voice is tight and stretched taut as the skin of a drum when he speaks. “What do you care?” Jaw tight, he lets his eyes flutter shut, feeling the phantom burn of an invisible lash against the back of his thighs. He tries to forget - and in his better moments - he can. He can pretend the scars aren’t there, that the worst thing never happened, that his life started and ended in Holmes Chapel and all that before time happened to another boy, in another place, far away from this one. It’s not a part of his body he looks at often and it’s a part that’s easy to hide from people and more importantly, from himself.

“I dunno - might - explain why you keep everyone out -”

“I don’t keep everyone out. They keep me out,” Harry snaps, tearing his seatbelt off. Louis pulls to the curb outside Harry’s house and Harry has the door open before they’re even fully at a stop.

“Wait,” Louis puts a restraining hand on Harry’s chest before he can bolt up his front walk. “I’m sorry, okay? It’s none of mine.”

Harry looks back and forth between Louis and his house, trying to decide whether he should stay and try to explain or run and hide like he always does. And he’s not sure what it is - maybe the way the streetlight glitters in Louis’ big blue eyes or the memory of him carrying his sisters off to sleep or even the faded Valentine under his bed - but he stays. He stays. Even though every muscle in his body is fighting it, even though he wants to run out of there as fast as he can, as far as he can. He’s beginning to realize he’ll never be fast enough to outrun his past. Time may heal all wounds, but that’s not to say it won’t leave scars on you.

“My dad,” he says firmly, staring right into Louis’ eyes, challenging him to say anything.

Louis’ eyes widen. “I’m sorry?”

“You asked who hurt me. It was my dad.”

“Harry,” Louis says, his expression so soft and pitying Harry can’t stand it. He didn’t ask for this. He never wanted any of this. He just wanted to be left alone. He just wanted to get through the rest of college without leaving anything behind. Like his grandmother’s house - just a few stray hair pins in the cabinet and furniture marks in the rug - to show he’d ever been here, that he’d ever been alive and dreaming within the walls of this village.

Since that worst day, Harry had tiptoed through life like he was navigating down a staircase in the dark. He’d been so cautious, so careful, only for one tiny misstep to send him falling headlong in love with Louis Tomlinson. And it wasn’t fair. Because Louis would never look at him that way. And he didn’t want to hope any longer because he, of all people, knew having expectations only led to disappointment.

“I don’t want your pity, okay?” Harry says, but there’s no fight in his voice any longer and he just sounds tired. As he hurries up the path to his house, he doesn’t dare look back, not even once, but he knows, he can feel Louis watching him.

Chapter 4

Chapter Text

Chapter Four

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

When Harry wakes up Sunday morning, the house is as still and silent as a tomb, dust motes swimming in the slanting shafts of light coming in through his cracked shades. His mum is working the noon to eight shift at the supermarket and according to the hastily scribbled post-it on the fridge, Gemma’s out with her boyfriend until late. It used to be when his whole family was out, Harry at least had Dusty to twine between his ankles, purring as he reached down to scratch behind her ears. He never really fully appreciated the warm presence Dusty brought to the house until she was gone. Now there’s just an empty food dish in the kitchen and a collar hanging by the door to remind him she was ever there.

Normally, Harry would bury himself in a book all day, but when he tries fleetingly, the words stare out at him from the page - bold and accusing - reminding him of the life he’s not living, of the people he’s been putting off, of the experiences he’s never had because he was afraid. Everywhere he’s ever traveled has been in the pages of a book and every person he’s ever loved outside his own family has been a character in a book and it’s only now that he’s realizing what a shame that is. When there are people like Zayn and Niall and Amy and Perrie in the world. When there are people like Louis.

Harry takes a long, indulgent shower, scrubbing the astringent hospital smell and lingering stench of sick from his skin. He dries off with his back to the mirror and dresses in his standard armor - dress shirt buttoned to the top button, a wool patterned sweater-vest, long trousers, sensible brown shoes, oversized glasses. He plasters his hair back into a gleaming helmet, until no hint of his wild curls remains. Once dressed, he sits down at the kitchen table and eats a bowl of Wheetabix, sips a mug a weak, milky tea and reads through the paper just as he does every day at breakfast time. But it doesn’t feel right.

Normally, Harry’s routines are an exercise in self-soothing. When he feels like the world is spinning madly out of control, it helps to have a system in place, to have rules and customs to abide by. But today, no matter how strictly he follows them, he feels unsettled. A pervasive sense of wrongness clings to him like an ill-fitting winter coat.

Louis comes swimming into his thoughts like a goldfish, shimmering and leaping and impossible to look away from. Louis’ bright, mischievous eyes, the expressive shape of his mouth forming words (like his lips are caressing the sounds), his small hands self-consciously smoothing his shirt over his slightly protuberant belly, tugging it down to cover his arse.

These images spur Harry into action. He washes his dish and mug and spoon and sets them in the drying rack. He straightens the kitchen and the living room. He polishes the countertops and surfaces until he can see his reflection in them. Harry can’t stand the sight of himself. He doesn’t know who he is any longer. He doesn’t know what this feeling is inside him, like a caged bird frantically thrumming its wings against the bars of its cage. He feels vaguely queasy.

The steady, relentless tock of the grandfather clock on the mantle in the living room seems overloud, marking the passage of time that until now he’s been content to let flow past him. Back when he was nobody. Back when his life meant nothing. Before Louis Tomlinson looked at him like he meant something. Before he started to believe it might be true.

Harry doesn’t give himself time to overthink it. Before he quite knows what he’s doing, he shrugs into his jacket and stumbles out into the cool autumn afternoon, breaking with routine swiftly and decisively, as if tearing off a bandage. The day is remarkably bright - the sun fractured into prisms by the leafy canopy of trees overhead - and he squints up into it like an animal emerging from a cave after a long period of hibernation. There’s a crisp bite in the air that speaks of the coming winter and he absently wishes he’d brought a scarf. But he doesn’t dare turn back. He shivers as a cool breeze winds down the lane, stirring a pile of leaves at his feet and nipping at the exposed skin at the back of his neck.

Harry doesn’t have a set destination in mind and he walks a long time before he fully exhausts himself. He sees new stores he’s never seen before cropped up on the avenue, meanders down side-streets he’s never walked down before and finds himself at a cafe in the middle of the afternoon, sipping a cup of strong coffee and watching people stroll down the lane through the plate-glass window.

He heads back out into the street before long, head down and hands tucked in his pockets. He walks until the cold is a part of him and he’s a part of it. He walks until his fingers and the tips of his ears are numb. In some ways, he feels more alone than he’s ever felt. Because, at least before - before Zayn and Niall and Louis - he could pretend it was a choice.

It’s growing dark as Harry approaches home again and he’s so lost in his own thoughts it takes him a second to realize there’s a hooded figure sitting on his front steps. As he gets closer, he recognizes Louis’ bowed head, arms hugged tightly around his small muscular calves, chin tucked between his knees. He stands at Harry’s approach, blowing breath into his cupped hands and rubbing them together vigorously to warm them.

“Hurry up, will ya? ‘M freezing my bollocks off,” Louis commands through chattering teeth as he hops comically from foot to foot.

“Er - right - ” Harry fumbles his key ring out of his pocket, promptly dropping it onto the Welcome mat. As he bends to retrieve his keys, he imagines he can feel the heat of Louis’ gaze skim over his bum and the backs of his thighs and he’s blushing when he rights himself again. Harry manages find the correct key and stab it into the lock without too much additional trouble, the door swinging open with a loud groan onto the darkened foyer. Without waiting to be invited in, Louis scoots in to escape the cold, his shoulder colliding with Harry’s as he moves past.

Harry closes and locks the door behind him and flicks on the switch. Awash in bright fluorescent light, the living room is as still and silent as a museum after hours. Seeing it through a stranger’s eyes, Harry can’t help thinking how shabby everything looks - the threadbare couch with cotton batting escaping the scuffed arms, the dingy, stained carpet, the bright red they’d painted the walls when they’d first moved in now faded to a musty, geriatric pink - especially when he remembers how nice Louis’ house had been, how obvious it was his parents had money.

“Very nice,” Louis nods appraisingly, shucking his Toms by the door as he strolls forward into the living room like he’s been there a thousand times before. He’s keeping one hand cupped around his hoodie oddly, like he’s trying to keep something from falling out of it and it’s making Harry exceedingly nervous. Actually, everything about Louis being here is making Harry nervous. Louis Tomlinson is in his house - in his living room - and Harry hasn’t got the first clue why. No one from Harry’s school has ever been to his house and he feels oddly exposed and underprepared.

Harry stands nervously in the arch with his hands clasped behind his back, watching Louis examine the framed portraits on the mantle with interest. There are pictures of Harry and his mum and Gemma, but tellingly none of his dad. And nothing before the age of six. Harry wonders if he’s meant to offer Louis a spot of tea or something to eat, if he’s being impolite, but it’s like he’s forgotten how his mouth works, how to make one part of his body act in conjunction with the others to form speaking or movement. He wonders what Louis could possibly want.

“Uh, I haven’t gotten a chance to finish washing your clothes yet, but I can throw them in the dryer if you want to wait a bit-” Harry blurts self-consciously when the silence becomes too much to bear.

“Is that why you think I’m here?” Louis snorts. “My clothes?”

“I dunno - I guess I just - assumed - Is everything - is Fizzy all right?”

Louis flops onto the couch, tossing several decorative throw pillows onto the floor in the process. “She’s fine. She asked about you. They all did. Kept asking when you’d come round again.”

“Oh, well - I - I guess - whenever your mum needs me-”

Louis frowns slightly, before tossing a pillow in Harry’s direction. “Will you come sit? You’re making me nervous.”

“Right. Sure. Of course.” Harry sits rigidly on the edge of couch cushion nearest the door, leaving a good foot or two of space between himself and Louis. He’s never been more aware of his own body or of its proximity to someone else. He thinks if he just moved his hand a few inches to the left, he could close his hand over Louis’ where it’s resting on the couch between them, like an invitation. It’s such a simple thing, but the distance between them has never seemed more insurmountable than it does right then. Their nearness feels at once unbearably exciting and agonizingly awful.

Louis is still cupping a hand around his hoodie, which upon closer inspection seems to be - well - seems to be wriggling.

“So...you know my dad’s a vet yeah?” Louis asks, gazing at Harry with paralyzingly blue eyes. Harry thinks he could stare into them all day every day and never tire of them, never fail to find something new to love in Louis’ multitude of expressions.

“Oh, no I didn’t - That’s uh - that’s pretty cool,” Harry stumbles, wondering why Louis came over to tell him that of all things.

“Innit just? The thing is - someone brought in a litter of abandoned kittens yesterday. And usually they’d just take them to the shelter like - but -”

Louis slowly unzips his hoodie, revealing the squirming black and white mass of fur he’d had tucked inside, looking immensely proud of himself. The kitten surveys its surroundings and lets out a tiny, plaintive high-pitched mew that makes them both let out a nervous blurt of laughter, shattering the tense silence.

Emboldened, Louis scoots closer to Harry, close enough that their thighs are touching, hip to knee. The sudden contact feels like a match being struck against a strip of sandpaper and Harry’s skin ignites with flowering heat.

“I thought maybe - I thought you might like her.” Louis’ hands brushes Harry’s briefly as he passes him the kitten and it’s like Harry never knew he had hands until that moment, until he’d felt them in Louis’.

Harry’s immensely happy for the distraction. (Maybe he actually can be in Louis’ presence for a whole entire minute without getting an ill-timed erection.)

The cat feels soft and warm and small in Harry’s over-large hands and he instinctively brings it up to his cheek to bury his face in its soft, round belly. When Harry makes the mistake of lowering the kitten to his lap to look over at Louis, the other boy is grinning, arms crossed and bare feet tucked up under him, head at a slight angle so he looks as impish and childlike as the illustration of Peter Pan in Harry’s childhood book. Harry loved that book. “I don’t - I don’t know what to say-”

“Thank you would be a good start,” Louis says sarcastically, but he’s smiling as he says it.

“Thanks-” Harry manages to sputter, once again completely bewildered by Louis’ thoughtfulness.

They’ve been lying on Harry’s bed for over two hours, listening to music and playing with the kitten (who’s now snoozing on Harry’s chest), but it feels like no time at all. At first, Harry was uncomfortable with Louis being in his room, with Louis touching his things and putting them back in the wrong places. But Harry slowly got used to his presence, to how Louis looked hovering over his desk and crouched on his floor and sprawled on his bed.

At first, it was difficult to carry on a conversation because all he could think was LouisLouisLouis. But the more they talked - the more Harry relaxed - the more he started to see Louis as just a regular person and not the gorgeous, intimidating star athlete he’s held up on a pedestal all these years. He briefly mourns the loss of that Louis - the loss of that image of Louis he’s held in his mind all this time - but he know it’s better this way. When Louis is a flesh and blood human, flawed and capable of mistakes, but infinitely more interesting and dimensional.

If Louis were a character in one of Harry’s books, he’s no longer a handsome, shadowy whisp of boy, but someone whose personality has as many facets as a cut diamond. He’s funny for one - like really funny and also kind and sometimes sarcastic. He’s insecure - doesn’t like the softness around his middle or his limp-wristed gestures - which surprises Harry more than anything because Louis always seemed so confident, so sure of himself. (And because Louis has always seemed perfect in Harry’s eyes.) But it fits in line with the way he’d deflated that night at dinner when Eleanor had criticized his weight, fits in line with the boy now in front of him, nervously tugging his shirt down over the hem of his jeans.

Louis loves to entertain and he shines under Harry’s careful attentions. A multitude of different expressions flash over his face as quickly as the brief glimmers you catch of a fish’s scales as it swims in and out of the shallows in a sun-dappled stream. Harry can’t take his eyes off of him. He feels like the luckiest person in the world just to spend a few hours in Louis’ company.

Louis teases Harry about being a secret hipster, as he scrolls through Harry’s meticulously curated (and oddly named) playlists of obscure indie bands and motown music and classic rock, but there’s a note of secret pleasure in his voice, like he enjoys picking Harry apart. And Harry - well - he doesn’t mind it much either.

His heart beats a little faster when Louis scans the book titles on his shelf, when he thumbs through Harry’s meagre Vinyl collection (mostly gleaned from swap meets and car boot sales), when his eyes pass over the postcards of faraway places Harry has tacked above his bed. The postcards are his someday soons. As in, someday soon I’ll start living. Someday soon, I’ll travel. Someday soon, I’ll find friends and someone to love and a place that feels like home and not just a motley collection of belongings.

It feels like Louis is chipping away at Harry’s carefully-constructed walls, brick by brick, and oddly enough, instead of feeling exposed, Harry feels relieved. It feels as if some of the weight’s been lifted.

He likes spending time with Louis. When you spent too much alone, your image of yourself starts to warp and you can only see the bad parts - the unlovable parts, the unworthy parts. Friends acted like a mirror - showing you the best version of yourself. And yes, Harry was still bookish and introverted, but he was also funny and intelligent and kind and a bit weird too - and it was Louis who brought those things out in him. It wasn’t just that Harry liked Louis - he’d always liked Louis - it was that he liked who he was when he was with Louis.

Harry’s mum pops her head in when she gets home from work, smiling knowingly when she sees Harry and Louis lying hip to hip, sprawled out on their stomachs, faces crowded close around Harry’s laptop. “Will you be staying for supper, Louis?” Harry’s mum asks.

“Oh, uh - if that’s okay?”

“Of course. Gem’s on her way home now. I’m just gonna go hop in the shower. Harry, love, would you mind starting dinner?”

Harry’s on his feet straight away, feeling like he just got caught doing something he shouldn’t.

The trick to making good tacos is all in the shell. Harry never buys (or lets his mum buy) those flavorless, stale pre-made things that masquerade as taco-shells, opting instead to fry soft, flour tortillas in boiling oil, until they’re all bubbled and crispy, but still a bit doughy in the center. He’s done it enough times to have it down to a science and he spices and simmers the ground beef to perfection on the other burner as he lays the taco shells on a paper towel to remove the excess oil.

Cooking is all about timing, something Louis doesn’t seem to understand or have the patience for as he keeps stealing bites of everything before its done or getting distracted by something the kitten’s doing. After seeing Louis fumble his way around the kitchen, Harry gives him some easy jobs he knows the boy can’t mess up - like grating the block of sharp cheddar and slicing some fresh tomatoes Harry picks from the back garden. (Louis having to be assured fifteen times that they were planted nowhere near where Dusty was buried before he deigns to eat one.) In the end, Louis grates half the cheese before he plops down on the floor with the kitten, trailing a piece of string he found in the junk drawer across the tile, but he looks so ridiculously adorable doing it Harry doesn’t complain as he picks up the slack.

Louis is exceedingly charming at dinner - making Harry’s mum nearly spit her wine out on several occasions she’s laughing so hard. He doesn’t make a big deal about Gemma either, who at eighteen years old and six-months pregnant gets more than her fair share of judgemental looks on the street. Louis does ask politely if he can rub Gemma’s stomach and turns to wink at Harry as he teasingly says, “I heard if you rub it, a genie comes out.”

Harry snorts. “Gem, maybe you can call him Gene,” he suggests wryly.

“Absolutely not,” Gemma protests, putting her hands over her stomach protectively. Then with a quirk of her lip, “It’s North Styles or nothing.”

Harry shows his mum and sister the kitten, who he decided to name Pancake after his favorite breakfast food (well really it’s eggs, but what sort of name is Egg for a cat?).

They sit at the kitchen table to eat - like a proper family - and it’s nice for a change. Usually Harry eats up in his room or in front of the telly because his mum’s at work and Gemma’s off God knows where (honestly what trouble can you even get up to when you’re carrying a nearly fully-formed human inside you?). Harry feels warmth radiating in his stomach when he glances around the table at their flushed, smiling faces and he thinks it’s only half the wine. It feels right somehow, complete, like a circle coming to a close.

When Louis takes his first bite of taco, he makes an obscene sound in the back of his throat that makes Harry blush so hard his glasses fog up. “I’ve died and gone to heaven,” he moans around a mouthful of ground beef, rolling his eyes to the ceiling as Harry nearly upends his water glass in his haste to take a sip.

Louis insists on doing the washing up after dinner and Harry feeds Pancake a little saucer of un-seasoned beef, despite Louis’ protests that he’s spoiling her.

After washing up, they brave the climb up to Harry’s room, collapsing onto his bed, limbs warm and heavy, bellies full of food and wine. Harry thinks he might be a bit drunk.

It’s fully dark outside, but the light in Harry’s room is soft and gold and swirling like Van Gogh’s Starry Night, everything moving a bit sluggishly and Louis’ skin sparkling like polished bronze. It feels different than their tentative interactions from before, lazy and intimate, their bodies close on the bed.

“About the other night-” Harry says, before he can stop himself because he’s in a confessional mood and he’s not sure when he will be again. He wants to tell someone - no, not someone - he wants to tell Louis.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Louis says softly, putting a gentle hand on Harry’s arm.

“I want to -” Harry lets out a heavy, shuddering breath. “I’ve just - I’ve never said it aloud to anyone - not even myself and I -”

“Take off your glasses,” Louis says and Harry complies, folding them and resting them on the nightstand, even though he has no idea where this is going. Louis reaches around him and flicks off the light, plunging the room into darkness. It takes a moment for Harry’s eyes to adjust, but once they do, he can pick out the edges of Louis’ face, limned in moonlight, his fringe soft and feathered across his forehead, his eyes sparkling like silver coins at the bottom of a wishing well.

“What are you doing?” Harry asks nervously.

“I find it’s easier to tell the truth in the dark,” Louis confesses drawing Harry to him tightly.

They’re spooning now - Louis’ bony knees digging into the backs of Harry’s knees and his stomach pressed up against Harry’s back and one arm tight around his waist. “You’re safe, okay?” Louis murmurs into Harry’s hair. “I’ve got you. No one’s gonna judge you. And no one’s going to hurt you because I won’t let them. You can say whatever you need to say, okay?”

Harry takes a deep, shaky breath, but relaxes as Louis gives his middle a reassuring squeeze. It is easier - talking to a wall - in the near dark - easier to pretend he’s alone and Louis isn’t there, that this isn’t about to happen. That he’s not about to tell his most closely-guarded secret to a complete stranger.

“My mum was seventeen when she met my dad. He was twenty-four. A footballer for Man U. He picked her out of a crowd at a match. He was a great looking guy and really charming, but he had a reputation for having a bit of a temper - getting in fights in pubs, knocking ex-girlfriends about, that sort of thing. But with my mum he was different. He was really kind and for a while, they were both really in love. Then, she got pregnant with Gemma. My mum was an only child - her dad died when she was young and my grandmother was very strict. She didn’t approve of my dad from the start, but when she found out my mum was pregnant, she lost it and kicked her out. My mum had nowhere to go, so when my dad asked her to marry him and move in with him she was elated.

But once she moved in, he started being more and more controlling - telling her what she could and couldn’t wear, flying off the handle if she went out with friends and didn’t tell him where she was going, monitoring what she ate and who she spoke to. She thought maybe he was just being overprotective because she was pregnant, but then Gemma was born and it got even worse. By the time I came around, there wasn’t a trace of that charming guy left. Every time something didn’t go the way he wanted - his team lost a game or he and my mum had a row, my dad drank. Until he was drinking all the time. It got so bad they kicked him off the team. He’d get a job for a couple of weeks, but inevitably, he’d do something to mess it up and he was out of work again.

He was a mean drunk and Gemma and I knew to stay out of his way when he was drinking. Still, there were times you’d be in the wrong place at the wrong time and he’d pinch our arms or our legs hard enough to leave a bruise or slap the back of our head. He spanked us too, but only when we’d done something to really piss him off. It was just - ” Harry shrugs, feeling Louis’ embrace shift around him, holding him closer. “I was a kid. I didn’t really know any different. Most of the times I blamed myself. I was too loud when he was taking a nap, I didn’t put enough ice in his drink - that sort of thing. When you’re young, you just assume your parents know what’s best for you, that they know everything, so I couldn’t even fathom that it might be him that was wrong.”

“You weren’t wrong,” Louis says softly, trailing his fingers over Harry’s arm. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Harry lets out a puff of breath the stirs the tiny hairs around his face. “Yeah, I know that now. I’m not even sure my mum knew the extent of it. She saw bruises on us sometimes when we were taking our baths and stuff, but most kids have bruises. But it started to affect me in other ways. I was scared all the time - especially of men who were bigger than me. I started to have bad dreams and I’d wet the bed. Which only made my dad angrier. He used to make me sleep on a piece of cardboard on the floor like a dog. And the messed up thing is - I didn’t even hate him - I hated myself - ‘cause I couldn’t control my bladder, because I was bad, because I’d messed up - ”

Harry’s lip trembles hard and he has to stop for a second, gasping for breath. He reaches for his inhaler on the bedside table and takes a puff, letting it settle into his lungs. As he lays back down, Louis presses a kiss into his shoulder-blade, burning like a brand even through his many layers of clothing. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

Harry rolls over to face him, staring into Louis’ eyes. He wants to know Louis is listening, wants to know he’s being heard, that what happened to him was real, that he’s real - that he’s not just some cellophane boy people stare straight through.

“He had this horse whip he kept by the door that he was always threatening us with. God knows where he got it. Maybe his parents used it on him. One morning, when I was six, he stumbled into my room, still drunk from the night before. And I’d wet the bed again and he just - he lost it. I’m still not sure he even knew was he was doing. He was - all wild looking - and,” Harry lets his eyes flutter shut because it’s too much - Louis looking at him and the silence and the memory of it as fresh as the day it happened.

“He grabbed the whip from by the door and he pulled my pants down and he just - I think he just meant to hit my arse a few times, to show me a lesson, but - he just - got in this state - and he wouldn’t stop. He was so drunk he couldn’t even aim properly and I was squirming so hard, he mostly got the backs of my legs. I just kept screaming, ‘stop daddy, stop, please-’ but he didn’t. He didn’t stop,” Harry chokes, tears streaming down his face unchecked. He takes another puff of his inhaler and allows a moment for it to sink in before he continues.

“I passed out eventually, right around the time I felt blood running down the back of my legs-”

“Oh God,” Louis’ voice is small and broken and it takes Harry a second to realize he’s crying. Louis is crying. “Harry - Oh, God. Harry-” Louis strokes Harry’s face and hair, smearing tears across Harry’s cheek bones with his thumbs.

“As soon as I was out of hospital, my mum packed a suitcase and we left him. He had money when they married but he’d drank most of it away and he’d made her sign a prenup, so we had nothing. No money, no house, my mum had never worked - and her own mum wouldn’t even take her calls. We stayed with some friends for a while, but my dad found us there - came round with flowers and apologies - but my mum wouldn’t even open the door. Then we were in this shelter for a while, but basically we were homeless until I was eight and then - when my grandma died, she left us this house and that’s - that’s when I moved here.”

Harry barely finishes his last words before Louis’ arms are tight around him, squeezing the air from him like he’s rolling toothpaste out from the bottom of the tube. Harry can feel every one of Louis’ ribs against his own, the small, sharp intakes of his breath and his rapidly beating heart. “I’m so sorry that happened to you. I’m so sorry that the people who were supposed to protect you didn’t. I’m so sorry,” Louis sobs.

“I - it’s okay. I’m okay-” Harry stammers.

Louis pulls back, cheeks glistening with tears so his skin looks like glazed porcelain. He stares into Harry’s eyes, unblinking, and Harry wants to look away but he can’t. Louis’ gaze has him on the line like a flopping fish.

Harry realizes it’s going to happen before it does. He experiences a brief, paralyzing moment of blind panic - he won’t know how - he’ll be bad - Louis will know he’s inexperienced - before Louis lips are on his and then every worry he has melts away into the soft, searing heat of their joined mouths.

Louis’ mouth is warm and insistent, his body is solid against Harry’s as he cards his fingers through Harry’s hair, tugging curls loose from the gel. Louis traces Harry’s mouth open with the tip of his tongue, sucking on Harry’s plump bottom lip in a way that unravels something in Harry and leaves him keening into Louis’ open mouth. Harry’s already half-hard and steadily thickening, about to draw back he’s so humiliated, when he feels Louis lazily rutting against his thigh. Arousal unfurls in Harry’s stomach, tendrils of white, blinding electricity snaking up his spine, alighting his nerve endings. He wants to die and at the same time, he’s never felt more alive. Kissing Louis is like nothing he’s ever felt and he never wants to stop feeling it. He feels like he can’t breath, but he doesn’t much care.

It’s like - all this time, Louis has been digging his fingers into a chink in Harry’s armor, slowly widening the hole, and now he’s finally broken through. He’s gotten inside and suddenly he’s everywhere. His hands are undoing the top buttons of Harry’s shirt. He’s mouthing along the smooth skin of Harry’s collar bone. His teeth are tugging on Harry’s ear-lobe. His lips are latching onto Harry’s throat. His tongue is laving the tears from Harry’s cheeks. And kissing him. And kissing him. And kissing him.

When Louis shifts abruptly and their erections collide, it knocks the breath right out of Harry and he has to stop and take another puff on his inhaler, dizzy and delirious from adrenaline and oxygen deprivation.

“All right?” Louis asks, walking his fingers up Harry’s inner arm in a way that makes his skin erupt into goosebumps. Harry nods rapidly, not talking his eyes off Louis’ mouth, swollen red from kissing. Kissing. Louis Tomlinson kissed him. He kissed Louis Tomlinson.

A buzzing sound breaks through Harry’s thoughts and he nods his head at Louis’ pocket. “Your trousers are vibrating.”

Louis smirks, about to make a snarky reply, but cut off by his phone’s insistent buzz. He has some trouble getting his phone out of his pocket as his jeans have grown noticeably tighter in certain areas and it’s nearly on the last ring when he finally frees it, his cheeks pink with embarrassment.

He sighs and hits accept, rolling his eyes at Harry to convey his annoyance at being disturbed. “Hi Mum, can’t talk - Oh, hi Daisy. Well. You’ve got to do as mummy tells you, darling.” Louis is listening intently to his four-year-old sister, but at the same time he’s running his fingers over Harry’s arm, absently, as if he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it.

“I’m sorry I won’t be home in time to read you a story.” Louis’ hand stills on Harry’s arm, voice becoming unbearably soft and fond. “Yeah. I’ll let him know. Love you too.” Louis hits End on the call, shoving it back in his pocket hastily. “Sorry. I usually put them to sleep at night. Daisy sends kisses.”

Harry’s stomach flutters and he wants to say something flirty like, I’d much rather kiss her brother, but he isn’t sure of the rules yet. He isn’t sure if this was a one time thing in the heat of the moment or if it’s something Louis wants to do again. With him. All he knows is that Louis very much has a girlfriend, one who just so happens to hate Harry’s guts. “I’ve got to go though. School night and all...”

“Right, yeah, of course,” Harry nods dumbly, the floaty feeling in his stomach turning sour. How could he have been so colossally stupid? Louis probably just felt sorry for him.

Louis chucks Harry under the chin. “Don’t look so glum chum.” He picks Harry’s mobile up off the bedside table as he flicks on the lamp and texts himself from Harry’s number. “There, now you have my number and I have yours. So - if you need anything - or just - if you want to talk, I’m here, yeah?”

Harry nods slowly, trying to wrap his mind around everything that just happened. He was crying and then they were kissing and then they weren’t kissing and the warmth of Louis’ body was gone and the cold was creeping in again. Harry slips his glasses back onto his face, everything coming back into sharp, unforgiving focus. He already has a good idea how Monday will go - back to having lunch in the disabled toilets and spending free period in the library, back to all of them looking through him like he’s a whisp of smoke.

“Hey,” Louis says softly, cupping Harry’s face. “Where’d you go?”

“Sorry - I -” he blinks a few times, forcing himself to look at Louis.

“You don’t have to apologize. Walk me down, yeh?” Louis asks, reaching for Harry’s hand. He squeezes it and the knot in Harry’s stomach loosens slightly, but not all the way. Louis is just a nice guy, he’s probably just trying to be kind and let Harry down easy. It didn’t mean anything. (It did. It did. It did.)

They sit on the front steps as they wait for Louis’ mum to pick him up, huddled together against the cold, Louis keeping his hands warm in Harry’s.

When Louis mum pulls up, the twin tongues of her headlights lick stripes up the side of the house and leave Harry blinking owlishly into brightness. Louis stands and ruffles Harry’s hair, like he’s a pet. “You should leave your hair curly more often.” Harry’s about to protest, to say that he likes his hair the way it is just fine thankyouverymuch, but then Louis bends his head down, lips brushing Harry’s ear as he whispers in a low, gravelly voice, “you look sexy a bit mussed up.”

Harry tries to sputter a reply, but mostly he just gapes, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish, as Louis jogs down his front walk.

Louis’ mum isn’t even fully reversed out of the driveway when Harry’s phone buzzes with a text. Close your mouth. xx ~ Louis

Chapter 5

Chapter Text

I hear you calling in the dead of night

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

Harry’s halfway through his morning bowl of Weetabix, elbow keeping his worn copy of Shadow of the Wind open on the kitchen table, when Gemma barges in, skidding across the tile floor on her stockinged feet. “Did mum leave yet?”

Harry glances up from his book, the words falling away from him like dead leaves shaking from a tree in autumn. He can still feel their shadows on his skin when he lowers his glasses to look at Gemma. She’s dressed in a pink dressing gown, hair still wet from the shower, holding a straightening iron aloft in one hand like she’s intent on injuring someone with it.

“Ten minutes ago,” Harry mumbles through a mouthful of high-fiber cereal.

“sh*t.” Gemma visibly deflates as she sinks down into the seat beside him, looking like a failed strawberry souffle. She glances despairingly at his mug of tea, letting out a heavy sigh as she props her head in her hands. “I really miss tea. Proper tea. With caffeine.”

“Is everything okay?” Harry dog ears the page he’s on in his book, redirecting his full attention to Gemma. She looks exhausted, which is par for the course when you have a fetus practicing footie moves in your stomach all night. Just like his grandfather, Harry thinks, but doesn’t say aloud. There are a lot of things he doesn’t say aloud.

“Just peachy. My back hurts, my ankles are swollen, my tit* are sore and now Ed can’t give me a ride to my appointment because his car’s broke down. So, I’m literally a beached whale.”

“Pretty sure whales don’t have ankles. Not sure about the tit*. I’d have to google it,” Harry says contemplatively.

“Not helping,” Gemma groans wretchedly, letting her head drop to the table with a wooden thunk.

Harry drops his spoon into his bowl with a clatter. “I could, if you wanted - ”

“Sorry?”

“I can’t help with any of that other stuff, but I could give you a ride to your appointment. If you wanted?”

He doesn’t want to be that person anymore. Marcel never had any friends to speak of and Harry - Harry does. Marcel was a loner that no one spared a second glance, but Harry is someone that gets kissed. By Louis Tomlinson.

“You sure you don’t mind?” Gemma gently prods. “I could reschedule.”

Even under ordinary circ*mstances, Harry would be happy to skip out on lessons, but it’s not ordinary circ*mstances. It’s the morning after Louis Tomlinson kissed him. And while that was all well and fine when they were holding each other in the dark of his bedroom, where no one could see them, he’s not sure how well these things hold up in the light of day. Like a broken vase that’s been glued back together and looks fine on the fireplace mantle, but shows a host of spider-webbed cracks when the sun strikes it.

If this was a book, Louis would make some grand gesture to show Harry how much he cared and Harry would be so overcome with emotion he would lift Louis off his feet and spin him around as he kissed him. But this isn’t a book - it’s his life. And unlike in books, there’s no happy ending awaiting him. Just more of the same. It’s like that poem by T.S. Eliot says: “For I have known them all already, known them all: Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, I have measured out my life with coffee spoons...” Except for Harry - it’s tea spoons.

“‘S not a problem. Really. I’ll bring a book.”

Gemma leans over and plants a smacking kiss on Harry’s cheek. “Brilliant. Give me twenty minutes to tame my fringe.”

Harry’s got the heat blowing in the car, Passenger playing on the stereo and a cup of Herbal tea for Gemma (and something stronger for himself) in the cupholders when Gemma finally maneuvers herself into the passenger seat, apologizing and out of breath. It’s been harder for her to get around these days, but she’s handling it remarkably well, all things considered.

Once upon a time, Harry used to envy her. Gemma was always the smart one, the pretty one, the lucky one. Things just came easily to her - friends, good marks, boys. And she was remarkably resilient - of the two of them, she’d come out of their childhood with the least amount of damage. Where Harry had folded in on himself to self-protect, Gemma had grown a spine of steel.

For a while, Gemma seemed like the one with the most potential too, the one most likely to leave Holmes Chapel, to actually see the places in the post-cards tacked above Harry’s bed. Which was why it had devastated their mum when Gemma got pregnant. Anne felt as if Gemma was repeating her own mistakes and while she was grimly determined to be supportive where her own mum wasn’t, she couldn’t completely hide her disappointment.

Luckily, Ed was nothing like their dad. He was over-the-top supportive - showing up at the house at odd hours with sweets for Gemma and things for the baby, working long hours at the bakery to save money. Gemma had a lot of suitors and Anne and Harry had both been surprised when she picked Ed out of everyone - this homely-looking, soft-spoken ginger kid - but the more time they spent around him, the more they understood. He was gentle and sensitive and smart and an amazing musician, whose thoughtful lyrics were right up there with Harry’s favorite poems. And best of all, he stuck around.

Gemma sleeps most of the way to the clinic and startles awake with a choked-off snore as Harry pulls into the car park, offering him a sheepish smile across the console. Harry comes round the car to help her out and they stumble into the office together, Gemma supporting herself against his side. Gemma checks in at the front desk and immediately ensconces herself in a pile of trashy gossip rags, while Harry thumbs to his place in his book.

It’s not been ten minutes before Harry’s phone is buzzing. For a second, he doesn’t realize the sound is coming from him, until all the ladies in the waiting room swivel round to look at him and Gemma gives him an exasperated look, nudging him sharply in the side with her elbow. “Are you going to pick that up?”

Harry had insisted he didn’t need a cell-phone when his mum bought Gemma hers - he knew they were expensive and he didn’t exactly have anyone to talk to on it and he always went straight home from school every day - but his mum had insisted. He knew she worried his dad would show up unexpectedly one day at his college, that she would spend her whole life worrying and looking over her shoulder and that it was him she worried about most. But he was glad now for her needless worries, because it meant that his friends could call him. It meant that Louis could call him.

Where are u? Harry grins stupidly at Louis’ name on his screen, then tries to discipline his face back into a normal expression. He feels giddy and happy, like a schoolgirl with a crush. For the first time in a long time, he feels like there’s something to look forward to, something to hope for. And it scares him more than anything - that tentative flicker of hope in his gut - because he knows how easy it would be to snuff out. The thing about being friends with people is that you need to trust them. Harry trusted his parents to look out for him and look what a mess that turned out to be. He trusted he would make friends in Holmes Chapel, that they would see beyond his geeky glasses and charity wardrobe and see the person he was inside, but that had been a flop as well.

Harry brings up his camera phone and snaps a picture of a poster of a pregnant woman hanging next to the front desk and sends it in a reply.

You do know you can’t get pregnant from kissing right? Louis texts back and Harry laughs out loud, slapping a hand over his mouth to muffle it as several pregnant women send affronted looks in his direction. Gemma lowers her magazine, coolly raising an eyebrow at him and he slumps down into his seat, properly chastised.

He hesitates a moment before typing a reply, face flaming as he quickly taps it out. You’re a really, really good kisser. Harry hits send before he can think about it, shoving his phone back into his pocket and swearing he won’t look at it for another five minutes. He lasts two.

He wrenches his phone from his pocket, face burning as he reads the response. Thanks. You need work. Guess we’ll just need to practice more ;)

Harry shoves the phone back into his pocket, but the words keep flashing in his mind like a neon sign. Practice more. Practice more. Practice more. He feels slightly faint.

Gemma smirks at him, abandoning her magazine. “So...you and Louis?”

“Me and Louis what?” Harry mumbles, staring down at the carpet and wishing it would swallow him whole. Gemma is an awful sister. He doesn’t know why he’s so nice to her. Should have just left her stranded.

“You like him,” Gemma accuses, poking him in the side.

Harry squirms just out of her reach. “Do not!”

“Yeah. You do. It’s all over your face. You light up like Vegas whenever he’s around.”

Harry lets out a harassed sigh. “You’re really taking all the fun out of coming out.”

“Oh please, we’ve all known since you were a kid,” Gemma teases, sticking her tongue out at him.

“I hope you have triplets,” Harry says grumpily, but there’s a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He’s come so far since meeting Louis and Zayn. Just a few weeks ago, he couldn’t have imagined coming out to his sister, let alone admitting his hopeless crush on a certain fit footballer. It’s just one more secret he’s unloaded in the past week and while it’s strangely freeing, he can’t imagine anything more terrifying.

“Just...be careful,” Gemma says softly, nudging his knee with hers.

Harry frowns. He’s been careful his whole life - careful to not incite his dad’s anger, careful to not attract the wrong kind of attention, careful to not step out of line - and it hasn’t done him any good. He just wants to do something reckless for once and he can’t imagine anything more reckless than falling for Louis Tomlinson.

“You weren’t at school today. Are you sick?” Zayn flops down onto Harry’s bed, dislodging a pile of library books onto the floor. Pancake makes a startled sound, snuggling herself further into the front pocket of Harry’s jumper.

Harry glances up from his dog-eared copy of Marcus Zusak’s the Book Thief, blinking images of wartime Germany from his mind. There’s a post-it note sticking to the knee of his joggers in Alma’s careful script that says: “The only thing worse than a boy who hates you: a boy that loves you.”

Harry sneaks the note back into the pages of the book, setting it on his bedside table. After Gemma’s appointment, they’d come home and changed into comfy clothes and Harry had made them some tomato soup and a couple of cheese toasties, which they ate on the couch watching mindless telly. Ed had showed up one o’clock with a bouquet of flowers to apologize, at which point Harry had retreated up to his room with Pancake and a good book.

He doesn’t remember hearing the doorbell, so Gemma must have let Zayn in. Zayn’s wearing a grayjumper, fitted jeans, chunky white trainers and a snapback, but his eyes are rimmed in black kohl, lips tellingly stained with the vestiges of red lipstick. Harry wonders how often Zayn actually dresses in drag - if it’s just a hobby or a sex thing or if he feels like a girl trapped in a boy’s body - but it doesn’t seem like the sort of thing you can just ask. “I had to take my sister to the doctor. What are you doing here?” Harry yawns into his sleeve.

“We’re going shopping...evidently,” he rolls his eyes at Harry to indicate he had nothing to do with the decision.

“Who’s we?”

“Me, you, Perrie and Amy. Maybe we can get you something to wear tonight.”

“What’s tonight?” Harry asks slowly, drawing out the words. It amazes him how easy it is for Zayn to make himself comfortable in places that aren’t his own home, his own room. Harry’s always been uncomfortably aware of how much space he’s taking up, always worried he’s being an imposition or a bother. It’s never been easy for him to be intimate with people who weren’t his own family and even then. Louis and Zayn always walked into a place like they belonged there and it was slightly unnerving.

“Hurricanes match. Come on. I told the girls we’d meet them there in twenty.”

“Just give me a minute in the loo, yeah?”

Zayn shrugs, kicking off his trainers and collapsing back onto Harry’s pillows. “Don’t fall in,” he smirks.

Harry takes a wee and washes his hands at the sink, standing for a minute in front of the mirror, examining his appearance objectively. He’s not a bad looking guy on the whole - straight, white teeth, a nice mouth, clear green eyes. He even has a little dimple in his cheek when he smiles, just like his mum, and he smiles more these days than he ever did in the past. Now that he has a reason too.

He just worries that Zayn’s trying to change him, to make him into something he’s not. Then again, it’s not like he knew who he was when he was Marcel. Louis was right. He had been hiding. Hiding behind the glasses and the clothes and the hair and his books. Because he’d learned from a young age that it was bad to be noticed, to be seen. And it’s a hard thing to unlearn.

Harry’s contemplative as he shuffles out of the bathroom, actually looking forward to a night outside his own circuitous thoughts. Zayn glances up guiltily from where he’s bent over Harry’s shoebox on the bed, dropping the Valentine he’d been holding in his hand like it burned him. “Harry, I’m so sorry - ”

Harry feels like he’s going to throw up. He staggers, grabbing his inhaler from his desk and taking a deep puff as he sinks down into his desk chair. He squeezes his eyes closed, shutting out everything but the sound of his own erratic breathing.

“I’m sorry, it was just - out and I saw it - I didn’t realize - ” Zayn stammers, coming closer to put a hand tentatively on Harry’s shoulder. “It was wrong of me. I shouldn’t have -”

“It’s okay,” Harry says finally. “It’s all right. It’s not like you didn’t already know...”

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” Zayn asks in a soft voice. “Like properly.”

Harry bites his lip, but doesn’t say anything. The nausea presses at the back of his throat, making it hard to breathe, let alone speak.

“Harry, just - just be careful.” It was enough when it was just Harry’s sister, but Zayn too? Does no one trust him to make his own decisions? To know what’s best for him?

“Maybe I don’t want to be careful,” Harry snaps, rounding on Zayn. “Did you ever think of that? Maybe I’m tired of being careful. Of doing as I should. Of keeping my head down. Maybe I just - ” he pauses, drawing a deep breath. “Maybe I just want to feel something.”

Zayn nods, but he looks sad, sitting cross-legged at the foot of Harry’s bed, idly picking at a torn square in Harry’s quilt. Pancake bats playfully at his hand and Zayn scoops up the kitten and cradles her to his chest. “I probably shouldn’t say anything, but I don’t - I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Say anything about what?” Harry raises an eyebrow.

“About Louis.”

“I know he has a girlfriend,” Harry sniffs. Sure, he doesn’t have a lot of experience dating, but he’s not an idiot. So why does everyone keep treating him like one?

“You don’t know everything,” Zayn says darkly. Harry’s about to protest that he knows a whole lot more than Zayn does, but Zayn beats him to the punch. “Louis and I - we used to - we used to be a we. Like, we used to date - or - fool around or whatever. Back in year nine.”

“You what?” Harry overbalances and nearly falls out of his chair in an effort to right himself. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I didn’t think - I didn’t know you liked him that much. I thought it was just a harmless crush. And because I don’t think Louis would want you to know. He wasn’t exactly proud of it.”

“So what? You dated secretly?”

“Something like that.” Zayn’s voice is soft and vulnerable as he continues to pick at the unraveling quilt, Pancake nudging at his fingers for a pet. “He was my first.”

“First boyfriend?”

“First everything,” Zayn clarifies, narrowing his eyes at Harry meaningfully. “And it was good for a long time. I mean, we were only fourteen - I didn’t expect him to jump out of a closet with a handful of rainbow confetti. I didn’t mind so much that he didn’t want anyone to know about me. As long as we still got to see each other in private...”

“What - what happened?”

"It was just casual at first, but then we - I -” he corrected, “started to have feelings for him. And one night, he finally convinced me to go all the way...”

“Zayn, I don’t know if you should be telling me this,” Harry says, in a pained voice. Because as much as he wants to know, the last thing he wants to do is betray Louis’ confidence. He’d much rather Louis tell Harry himself, in his own time, than hear it second hand.

“No,” Zayn says firmly. “You need to know, okay? The sex - it - it meant something to me.” Tears sprung to Zayn’s dark eyes, hovering on the edge of his lids for a moment before spilling over, running down his cheeks and chin, getting caught up in his dark stubble. Harry moves closer, sitting next to his friend on the bed. He wants to touch Zayn’s face, but his hands hang just limply at his sides.

“And I thought - I mean, I thought it meant something to Louis too. He was so kind and gentle and he said all the right things. I guess I should have known it was all an act. The day after - when I came into school - he was walking hand in hand with Eleanor Calder. No explanation, nothing. I was devastated.” Zayn swipes his hand over his face, streaking kohl liner over his cheek. “When I finally worked up the guts to ask him about it, he said he and his friends had a bet that he would take my virginity. And now that he’d won, there was no longer any need to keep seeing each other.”

Harry frowns. “That doesn’t sound like Louis.”

“Why would I lie?” Zayn chokes, angrily scrubbing tears from his face. “Why would I lie about something like that?” And it’s Zayn’s voice, the fragile, ragged quality of it, that finally convinces Harry.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest - it’s just - he seemed different - with me.” Harry picks the Valentine up from the box, holding it carefully by its frayed edges, feeling everything inside him crumbling like brittle paper.

The words come pouring out of him before he can stop them. “I was six years old the first time I heard the phrase ‘dick-sucking lips’.” Harry closes his eyes, shuddering as he recalls the salty taste of the man’s thumb as he ran it suggestively over Harry’s bottom lip. When he opens his eyes again, Zayn’s eyes are wide with shock. Harry keeps going.

“I was pretty for a boy. Not handsome or cute. Pretty. And it was never a problem until we lost our house...But then...Some of the shelters were okay, but other ones - ” Harry shivered. “The worst that ever happened was a guy exposed himself to me. I mean - there were some narrow escapes - but it was never anything more, thank god. I’m lucky in that respect. But I learned pretty quickly to recognize the way certain guys looked at me and to avoid them. I tried - I tried to make myself ugly. That’s why the glasses and the clothes and the hair. I thought if I wasn’t pretty they would leave me alone.”

Zayn had stopped crying and was quietly staring at Harry in disbelief. “When I moved to Holmes Chapel, I didn’t fit in. Everyone made fun of the way I dressed and the way I spoke and my glasses. But they were my protection, my armor, and I was scared to let go of them. I thought maybe people would be able to see past them, see that I was worth knowing. That winter, I made everyone these Valentines - by hand - because I wanted the other kids to like me. And Louis - Louis was the only one who gave me one back. I just - I never understood why. I still don’t.” Harry bites his lip, staring up at Zayn with watering eyes. “I’m sorry he hurt you. I just - I thought he was different - I thought he was better, you know?”

Zayn hugs Harry tightly, smoothing a hand over the back of his hair. “Harry, you’re the bravest person I know. And I don’t want you to think there aren’t good people in the world because there are -”

“Like Perrie?”

Zayn pauses. “Yeah, like Perrie. And Niall and...other people...I don’t want you to close yourself off just because Louis is a dick.”

Harry snorts. “Aren’t you mates with him?”

Zayn releases Harry, shrugging his shoulders. “It took a long time. I'm not still in love with him is that's what you're worried about. I mean, we’re in a good place now, but it’s not like you just forget something like that. In the end, I realized it hurt me more to hold a grudge than it did to just forgive him. Listen, if you don’t want to go out tonight, I understand-”

“No." Harry stood resolutely, feigning more confidence than he felt. "f*ck him. Let’s go. I’m not going to sit around feeling sorry for myself all night. He's not worth it."

Harry just wishes he could believe it.

Harry has a good time once he’s out. Almost good enough to forget the whole thing with Louis. Almost... The girls insist on picking out clothes for him and stand outside the dressing room door while he tries them on, gushing over how fit he looks when he emerges. It’s a real confidence booster and Harry spends all of the babysitting money he has left, but he doesn’t mind too much. And Zayn treats them all to ice-cream afterwards in the food court.

Everyone goes back to Zayn’s house to get ready before the game. Harry’s still feeling on edge from their earlier conversation and Perrie is more than generous with her hip flask so he drinks quite a bit more than he means to. Enough that when someone shoves a jumper at him from the back of Zayn’s closet, he doesn’t think anything of shrugging into it - doesn’t even think to ask if it was Louis’ before they’re headed out the door. It’s not until Louis smirks and says, “nice jumper” to him at the start of the game that Harry realizes and by then it’s too late.

Harry thought it would be easy to ignore Louis with so many other things going on, but he’s impossible to look away from, glowing as he streaks across the darkened pitch like a shooting star. Perrie pours a generous amount of Bailey’s into Harry’s hot chocolate and he’s staggering a bit as he heads to the toilet for the third time that evening.

He’s just washing his hands when something - or rather someone - connects hard with his shoulder. Even under normal circ*mstances, Harry would have difficulty reining in his limbs and regaining his balance, but he’s a bit pissed so he doesn’t stand a chance in Hell. He lets out a strangled yelp as his back is slammed against the metal divider of the toilet stall, shoulderblades ringing like a struck bell on impact.

Stan’s face is close enough that Harry can smell his yeasty breath - reeking of beer and stale chips. There’s ketchup crusted in one corner of his mouth, which is curled up in a sneer. “Stay the f*ck away from Louis.”

“What?” Harry asks incredulously. He knew Stan was a dick - he hasn’t exactly forgotten being pantsed by him in swim class all those years ago - but for the most part Stan has left him alone for the past couple of years.

“You heard me,” Stan hisses, underlining his words with another hard shove that cause Harry’s teeth to rattle in his head. He had already planned on staying well away from Louis, but it pisses him off that Stan of all people is trying to tell him what to do.

“He’s a big boy. He can make his own decisions,” Harry snorts, surprised at his own audacity even as he says it.

“He’s not a f*cking poof.”

"Jealous he’s not putting out for you then?” Harry laughs, slightly hysterically, just before Stan’s fist connects with the side his face. For a moment, everything’s black and then there’s a raw pounding in Harry’s head and a sharp, pulsing pain over his cheekbone.

Harry lifts his hand to gingerly prod at his cheek and his fingers come away red. In the dim fluorescent light, the blood looks glowing and strange and his stomach rolls with nausea.

“What the f*ck?” Harry’s had just about enough of piggy little bullies like Stan pushing him around. What did he ever do to them? Why does he feel like his whole life is an apology for existing? It’s not his fault. None of it’s his damn fault. Whatever he did or didn’t do with Louis, he didn’t bring this on himself.

Adrenaline pounding through his veins, Harry shoves Stan away from him with all his might. The other boy is caught off guard, falling in comically slow motion and landing hard on his arse. Stan’s on his feet much too quickly and Harry’s brain is already a scrambled mess, swimming in alcohol and reeling from Stan’s punch, so his reaction time isn’t as good as it could be and he gets rewarded with a punch to the side of his mouth.

Harry launches himself off the wall, lips spraying blood in arc across the tile as he tackles Stan to the floor, blindly raining punches down on him. Stan fights back, dragging his nails sharply across Harry’s face and driving his knee up into Harry’s stomach. The air goes briefly out of Harry’s lungs, but he doesn’t stop. He’s lost in the satisfying sting in his knuckles and the rhythm of his fists. It’s not until he feels strong hands pulling him back that he realizes what he’s done.

Stan’s not much worse off than Harry - Harry’s fairly pissed and his aim was well off - but there’s still blood streaked across his face that Harry’s fairly sure isn’t all his. The impact of what he did hits him all at once and he turns into the chest of whoever stopped him, shaking and sobbing. “I’m sorry - I didn’t mean - I’m sorry -”

“Come on,” a soft voice says, helping him to his feet.

It’s not until they’re outside that Harry realizes it was Liam who broke the fight up. He’s still wearing his grass-stained shirt but he’s off the pitch, so Harry figures it must be half-time. Liam sits Harry down in the dirt and hands him his inhaler. Harry gratefully takes a puff, but he can’t stop crying and gasping, wiping blood and snot into his shirt sleeve. Into Louis’ shirt sleeve.

“Are you hurt?” Liam asks, mopping blood from Harry’s brow with a wet wad of loo roll.

Harry almost finds his concern funny. Liam thinks Harry’s crying because he’s hurt, when in actuality, Harry couldn’t care less about that. The real reason he’s crying is because he lost control in there. Because he’s no better than Stan and what’s more, he’s no better than his dad. A drunk and an abuser. It doesn’t matter that Stan hit him first. It doesn’t matter than the other boy started it. If Liam hadn’t pulled Harry off, he’s not sure he would have been able to stop. He’s not sure he would have wanted to.

Harry buries his face into his knees, shaking uncontrollably. “Jesus, what happened?” he hears Zayn’s voice from somewhere above him.

“Just get him home, okay?” Liam says, giving Zayn’s shoulder a lingering squeeze. Liam’s eyes meet Zayn’s and for a second, Harry thinks he’s going to say something else, but then Liam just shakes his head. “I’m gonna go check on Stan.”

Harry grabs the hem of Liam’s shirt as he passes, tugging on it. “Please. Liam. Please tell him I’m sorry,” Harry gasps.

Liam gives him an odd look. “Just get yourself home safe, okay?” He stays a moment longer, speaking to Zayn in soft, hurried whispers that are carried away on the wind. Finally, Liam disappears into the loo and Zayn helps Harry up, keeping an arm tightly around his waist.

“Come on. You’re all right. I’ll take you to mine, okay?” Harry doesn’t have it in him to fight any longer and just nods, wiping his face into his shirt sleeve.

Zayn sets a steaming mug of tea down on the bedside table. Harry’s just out of the shower, dressed in a borrowed pair of Zayn’s sweats and he’s only now stopped shaking. His whole body hurts, even bits he didn’t know could hurt, but his mind feels a bit clearer. He takes a steadying sip of tea, which loosens some of the tightness in his chest. Ever since Louis came into his life, it’s been one disaster after another. Yet strangely, all Harry wants to do is call him. All Harry wants to do is have Louis kiss his bruised, swollen face until it doesn’t hurt anymore.

“You want to tell me what happened back there?” Zayn asks, sinking down beside Harry on the bed.

Harry shakes his head, water droplets flying from his wet curls. “I’d rather not. If that’s okay?”

Zayn shrugs. “Suit yourself. You want to watch TV?” Zayn doesn’t wait for an answer before crawling into bed and grabbing the remote. Harry can’t imagine going to sleep feeling the way he does, so he goes along with it.

They’re ten minutes into the movie - some ditzy American rom com Harry’s not quite following - when his mobile buzzes. Harry picks it up and glances at it quickly, thinking it’s probably his mum saying goodnight. He already texted to let her know he was at Zayn’s, stomach turning only slightly at how happy she’d seemed that he’d made a friend. When he sees Louis’ name light up the screen, he wishes he hadn’t checked. The match’s just finished, so Louis probably doesn’t know yet what happened, but he will soon. Harry still can’t quite believe he punched Stan in the face. He might even feel a little proud if he didn’t feel so sick over it.

You looked cute tonight. I could get used to seeing you in my clothes. Wouldn’t mind seeing you out of them either ;)

Harry’s hands are shaking as he sets his mobile back on the bedside table, face-down. Zayn raises a questioning eyebrow at him. His phone buzzes a few minutes later and several times after that, but Harry doesn’t dare look at it again. He wishes he could go back to the previous night, lying in the dark with Louis, blissfully ignorant of everything that was about to happen. Everything had seemed so simple then, so clear. He’d had no illusions that it would be easy, but he’d never imagined it would be this hard.

Harry falls asleep part way through the movie, with Zayn’s arms around him, and wakes up feeling like he got hit by a truck.

Chapter 6

Chapter Text

I hear you calling in the dead of night

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

Harry shouldn’t be surprised to see Louis and Eleanor together at school on Tuesday. It shouldn’t hurt to see Louis’ arm slung around her thin shoulders as they cross the courtyard. It shouldn’t hurt to see her turn her face into Louis’ chest, laughing at something he said moments earlier. It shouldn’t hurt when Louis’ hand comes up reflexively to stroke her dark hair. And when Louis meets Harry’s eyes over the top of Eleanor’s head, it shouldn’t feel like Harry’s stepped on a landmine, like he’s going to bits all at once.

It was only a kiss after all. Yes, it had been Harry’s first kiss. But in the grand scheme of kisses – Harry was just one in a long line of kisses for Louis. It didn’t have to mean anything. So why did it?

Harry manages to ignore Louis’ texts – ranging from politely concerned to outright desperate. He even manages to avoid him in the corridor between lessons, darting around corners and leaping into empty classrooms at the last second. By lunch time, he’s beginning to feel a bit like a secret agent (only way more clumsy and way less cool) and he’s relieved for the reprieve to the boy’s toilets on the third floor. He hugs the brown paper sac with his lunch in it to his chest like it’s a life-preserver and he’s alone in the middle of the open sea.

In the toilets, Harry’s safe. Safe from the prying eyes, safe from the whispers that halt abruptly whenever he enters a room (exaggerated rumors about his fight with Stan have reached ludicrous proportions), safe from the sight of Louis and his girlfriend cuddled together in the back row of Biology class. No one can get to him here. No one can see the silent tears streaking down his face as he hugs his knees up to his chest. As he quietly implodes.

A soft knock on the door abruptly halts Harry’s increasingly despondent train of thoughts.

Of all the loos in the world, someone had to walk into this one. During lunch, it gets the least amount of foot-traffic – partly because of its distance from the canteen and partly because it’s run-down. It’s part of the old wing that hasn’t been restored yet and there’s a pervading scent of damp and rust in the air that discourages even the most adventurous snoggers from frequenting it as a make-out spot. Every once in a while, someone will get caught smoking in there – as it’s one of the few places at school where the smoke detectors aren’t up to snuff - but Harry can deal with a little smoke. What he can’t deal with is another crack in his shell, not when he’s already working so frantically to repair the damage.

“Stall’s – um – it’s occupied,” he stammers, voice watery and thin from crying.

“Harry?” Louis asks softly. “It’s me.” Harry gives a loud, distressed sniffle as he wipes his runny nose into his shirtsleeve. His face still feels swollen and raw - like ground hamburger meat - and it hurts to the touch.

Louis lets out a heavy sigh on the other side of the door that makes Harry’s chest ache, makes his hands itch to reach out and touch the other boy. His exploration of Louis’ golden skin had been brief and ephemeral – in the morning he had evaporated in Harry’s hands like smoke or breath. Their time together seems distant now, like a sepia-tinged photograph from a halcyon summer long past, and not something that had happened just a few nights ago.

For a moment, Harry allows himself to press his palms to the stall door, imagines he can feel the heat of Louis’ hands through the dented, graffitied metal. But all he feels is coldness. Harry blinks back bitter tears. Why won’t Louis just go away? Why won’t he just leave it alone? Doesn’t he realize how much harder he’s making it for Harry to let him go?

“Harry, I know you’re in there. Please -” Louis’ voice breaks on the word, like a brittle branch snapping in a winter’s frost.

Harry doesn’t move from his perch on the closed toilet seat lid, but from under the stall he can see Louis’ legs dangling down from where he’s seated on the radiator, the cuffs of his pants rolled up to display his thin ankles. With an wrenching ache in his chest, Harry recognizes the smiley face he drew in marker on Louis’ white Converse shoe in the hospital waiting room the night Fizzy was running a fever.

“Liam told me about what happened with Stan – well, not everything – just that you two fought. I can’t believe you punched him,” Louis snorts incredulously, not hiding his obvious delight. You’d think as his best friend, Louis would relish Stan’s demise a little bit less. “Probably deserved it. I stopped talking to him, you know. Because of you.”

Louis’ sigh is lost in the crunching sound of foil as he unwraps his sandwich. “I wish you’d talk to me, Harry.”

Harry’s on the verge of saying something, anything, but then he thinks of Zayn’s face as it was that night in his bedroom - spectral and pale – and he unwraps his sandwich instead. Cheese and Branston pickle. In a lot of ways, it’s like nothing’s changed. In other ways, it’s like everything has.

It’s quiet, save for the rustle of their lunch wrappers as they eat and the drip of an errant faucet. Louis stays all through lunch. When he’s done with his food, he throws his rubbish in the nearest bin and sits in silence until the bell. Harry tries to read, but he keeps skimming the same words, straining to hear the even sound of Louis’ breathing on the other side of the door. Louis doesn’t say anything else, but it’s enough to know he’s there.

Wednesday, Louis is back. He doesn’t say anything, but Harry knows it’s him, recognizes the dark wash of his skinny jeans and the impossibly tiny pair of black Vans he’s wearing, one shoelace flopping about untied. Once again they eat their lunch in companionable silence. It’s the same Thursday and Friday. Thursday, Louis slides an unfinished bag of crisps under the stall door and Harry takes a handful before sliding it back, mumbling a barely audible thank you.

Friday, Louis asks about Harry’s weekend plans, as if Harry would have any. He’d been planning on revisiting Vonnegut – he’s just in that sort of mood lately. And so it goes.

“The girls miss you,” Louis says. “I’m babysitting Saturday. If you wanted to – you could come over. I’m sure they’d be glad to see you.”

“I’m okay, thanks,” Harry says, because it’d be rude not to respond and he’s near his breaking point with all this. It’s hard enough to avoid thoughts of Louis when he’s alone, but it’s next to impossible when he’s constantly there.

Louis pauses outside the stall door on his way to throw his rubbish out. “It’s not just them,” he says softly.

Harry’s throat suddenly feels very dry and tight, like he’s swallowed a spoonful of cinnamon powder. It’s all he can do not to choke. “I’m – I’m sorry?”

“It’s not just the girls…that miss you.” It’s barely an admission, but the implication is enough. Louis misses him – him - Harry. Harry doesn’t say anything, but he bites down hard on his bottom lip, hard enough to break the skin. The bitter, coppery tang of blood floods his mouth and he lets his eyes flutter shut as the pain fades to a dull throb.

“Did I – did I do something wrong?” Louis asks carefully, his voice squeaking endearingly on the word ‘wrong’.

“Why don’t you ask Zayn?” Harry snaps. It’s meant to come off as angry or accusatory, but his voice is soft and fatigued. Over the past week, Louis has eroded away at his anger, like a sharp, jagged bit of glass tumbled smooth by the sea.

Harry opens the stall door, ending their weeklong stand off at last. Louis’ eyes are wide and unblinking, glossy with barely restrained tears. Bright spots of pink color his high cheekbones and he looks as if he’s just been slapped. His hand briefly reaches out to brush the sleeve of Harry’s jumper before he lets it fall to his side again, as if he’s forgotten himself. “Harry–”

Harry draws back, staring down at his shoes because he can’t bear to see the hurt look in Louis’ eyes, can’t stand the idea that he was the one who put it there. “I have a quiz in Maths. I should go.”

Harry’s back to spending free period in the library. It’s quiet there and in the afternoons, the sun slants through the windows, alighting on the worn patch of carpet he’s come to think of as his own. His back aches where it’s pressed against a towering metal shelf of books and his limbs are stiff from being folded up in the same position for so long, but he welcomes the familiar, physical ache. The intermingling scents of carpet deodorizer, dust and aged paper remind him of home – not his home, but home as it should be - a cozy, quiet place where no ghosts from the past linger on beyond their welcome.

Time passes for Harry in sentences, in paragraphs, in the lengthening of shadows across the library floor. It’s not quite as easy as it once was to lose himself in books, but he’s happy to find it’s not impossible. Except now, it’s as if every line of poetry was written about Louis’ eyes or Louis’ smile, every song that comes up on shuffle on Harry’s Ipod is about Louis’ laugh or that languid, fluid way he has of holding himself, like his whole personality is just barely contained inside him, like he’s about to spill over the edges.

Louis is less like a boy than a trussed up bag of birds struggling in a million different directions. The only time Harry ever saw him lie still was when they were holding each other on his bed in the dark. Harry thinks love must be like that – the still point of a turning world – the fixed axis on which everything else spins – madly, madly on. Not that Louis is in love with him…

Still, everything Harry eats or dreams or does or sees in the days after he kisses Louis is ripe with painfully exquisite longing for the one person he can’t have. Everything seems brighter and more fiercely beautiful, and like autumn leaves, somehow poised on the edge of decay. Instead of finding escape in books as he once did, Harry finds the very thing - the very person - he’s trying to escape from. Louis is everywhere. And he’s nowhere at all. He’s close and he’s never quite close enough.

It’s only a matter of time before Alma notices. Harry’s a bit dreamy these days – more so than usual – spending long periods staring out the window, holding his mug of tea in his hands until it grows cold without ever having taken a sip.

“You know, I was around your age when I met my first girlfriend,” Alma says casually Friday afternoon, keeping her back to Harry as she reshelves books. Normally, Harry would offer to help, but she’d waved him off when he tried to stand.

Harry sets the biography he’s reading aside, watching Alma’s thumb skim reverently over the book spines. He and Alma don’t talk much about their private lives – their common language has always been literature – and it’s always been enough. Harry had never known, for example, until she’d said the word “girlfriend” that she was gay and it makes him feel a little rotten that he’d never thought to ask. It just never seemed relevant before.

“I was working at this coffee shop at the time and she used to come in every day. Order the same thing, sit in the same corner. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. I used to write snippets of poetry on her cups. It took me a whole damn year to work up the courage to ask her out.”

Harry tilts his head to the side to get a better look at Alma’s face. She looks like the same old Alma – warm olive skin, dark hair twisted into a messy chignon at the nape of her neck, stray curls frizzing about her face. She’s dressed in a long, loose floral dress with gaping front pockets, an oversized mustard-yellow cardigan, her cat-eye glasses dangling on a beaded chain around her neck. She’s as familiar to him as his own reflection – maybe even more familiar seeing as how he tends to avoid mirrors - but in some ways, it’s like he’s seeing her now for the first time. It’s strange, he thinks, how we can look at the same people every day, and never really actually know what’s going on inside them. It’s like he’s opened up the face of a pocket watch to find the intricate, mechanical clockworks hidden inside.

“What happened?” Harry asks curiously.

Alma chuckles softly. “I married her.”

“What?” Harry sputters. He’d not been expecting that.

Alma laughs, soft wrinkles fanning out from around her kind, dark eyes. “Well, not right away. We broke up a few times, tried to date other people. She dated a guy for a while.” Alma makes a face at him to show just how she felt about that. “But we always came back to each other. When it’s right, you just know. I mean, you’re not always smart enough to accept it, but with the right person, it’s like-” she pauses and Harry’s left hanging on her last word.

“It’s like what?” he asks, a bit breathlessly.

“Like everything in your head just goes quiet. All the voices that told you that you weren’t good enough, that you weren't attractive or interesting or deserving enough, that you're not inherently loveable, just fall away. And it’s just you and them and it’s beautiful. It’s the most beautiful thing in the world, Harry. And when I think – what if I’d never plucked up the courage to ask her out – it makes me sick to my stomach. Because I can’t imagine my life today without her.”

Harry wants to ask why she’s telling him this, why now, but he doesn’t want to seem unappreciative. It’s a great story, the sort of love story he’s a real sucker for in books. He just doesn’t understand what it’s got to do with him.

“You know, your young man stopped by earlier. Footie shirt, fringe a bit like this-” she demonstrates by fanning her fingers out across her forehead.

“He’s not my – he’s not – he has a girlfriend,” Harry sputters, face flooding with heat as she studies his expression carefully.

Alma laughs knowingly. “Of course not.” She stoops down to hand him a book off her metal rolling cart. “Here, I checked this out for you.”

Harry says, staring down at the familiar cover of Richard Siken’s Crush in puzzlement. “I’ve read this like a thousand times.” In fact, Harry had checked the book out so many times Alma had given him his own copy for Christmas last. So why is she giving him the library copy when she knows perfectly well he’s got his own?

“Sometimes you read something a thousand times and you can still find something new in it,” she says cryptically, dropping a wink at him before she rolls her cart over to the next aisle. Harry glances at his watch and realizes he only has a few more minutes before his next class. He tucks the book into his messenger bag and doesn’t give it a second thought until later that night.

Harry’s sitting cross-legged on his bed after dinner, taking his World History book out of his leather satchel to do homework, when the slim volume of poetry falls out into his lap. He’d had a French test in the afternoon and in his haste to conjugate French verbs, he’d completely forgotten Alma gave it to him. Pushing his homework aside, he thumbs to the first page. It opens to the first poem, Scheherazade, the book spine long ago loosened from wear. Harry’s eyes skim over the words, like a stone skipping across the surface of a still pond. He already knows them all by heart, but today the words catch on his skin like barbs, digging in, making it hurt.

Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us. These, our bodies, possessed by light. Tell me we'll never get used to it.

Harry’s about to close the book, to let the words sink their hooks into him, to let them draw blood, when he sees a colored post-it note sticking out from one of the pages. He flips through to it, immediately recognizing the last stanzas of You are Jeff. There’s a pale purple post-it note stuck to the page, but it’s not in Alma’s careful recognizable script. The writing is shaky, almost hesitant. Can we talk? Meet me at Cobbles Tea Room at 7 PM tonight. I’ll be waiting. Louis xx

Harry stares at the note, like he’s brought it into being just by the force of his longing for Louis, like it’s not quite real, like he made this part up.

When he lifts up the note to put it in his shoebox with the others, he realizes the very last passage is underlined in pen.

You're in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won't tell you that he loves you, but he loves you. And you feel like you've done something terrible, like robbed a liquor store, or swallowed pills, or shoveled yourself a grave in the dirt, and you're tired. You're in a car with a beautiful boy, and you're trying not to tell him that you love him, and you're trying to choke down the feeling, and you're trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you've discovered something you don't even have a name for.

Harry’s read the words a million times before, but today they buzz beneath the surface of his skin like an swarm of agitated hornets, angry and insistent. Did Louis underline those words? And if it was Louis, what did it mean? Why those words, why now? Harry glances at his watch and realizes it’s already half seven. Which means he might already be too late.

He grabs his boots and jacket and makes a mad dash for the stairs, tripping halfway down and nearly flying arse over tea kettle. Gemma and Ed are sitting on the couch watching Bad Education when Harry rushes into the living room. Gemma’s got her feet in Ed’s lap and he’s absently rubbing her swollen ankles, attention focused on the telly. They both glance up when he rushes in. “I need a ride,” he blurts out, without preamble.

“Have you gone mental?” Gemma asks, raising a cool eyebrow at him.

“Please. I’ll - explain – on – the – way –” Harry pants, before taking a long pull on his inhaler. Ed gives Gemma an apologetic shrug, before sliding out from under her feet.

He slings an arm around Harry’s shoulders, “Come on then, Romeo.” And that’s when Harry realizes Gemma told Ed about Louis. He makes a mental note to strangle her after the baby’s born. (It’s really hard to be properly mad at a pregnant person.)

“Will you pick me up some Salt and Shake on the way back?” Gemma calls out just as Ed’s about to shut the front door behind them.

“Yes, darling,” Ed calls back. Harry just shakes his head at the older boy, giving him a look that conveys, ‘you are so whipped.’ But deep down, he actually finds it kind of sweet, and he hides a smile behind the turned collar of his coat as they head to Ed’s car.

Harry’s been to the Cobbles Tea Room a handful of times before – mostly around Christmas time with his mum and Gemma - but once with Alma as a special treat before winter hols. It’s a quaint brick multi-level attachment, ringed in by a white picket fence, a trellis of ivy creeping up over the doorway. Upstairs is a Bed and Breakfast and out front, there’s a hand-painted wooden sign shaped like a teapot and cup hanging from an ornamental iron bar. When the weather’s nice, there are tables and chairs set up outside so you can drink your tea in the weak English sunlight and maybe partake in a relaxed game of chess or checkers. Today the weather’s decidedly not nice – flowers of frost etched over the glass window-panes so that all Harry can see is hazy gold light emanating from inside, like sun shining through an icicle.

Harry thanks Ed for the ride, barreling through the front door like a runaway horse fleeing from a burning stable. Indoors, the tearoom is a cozy place – a motley assortment of mismatched tables and chairs upholstered in clashing floral patterns. Heavy velvet drapes keep out the cold and there’s a fire burning staunchly in the hearth. A gray cat curled up in the window seat slowly raises its head to peer at Harry peevishly through one cracked eye for disturbing its rest, before tucking its head back into its legs.

There aren’t any patrons in the café at this late hour – it’s normally frequented by the elderly residents of Holmes Chapel who can’t be bothered to come out in the cold or after the sun goes down. For a second, Harry is completely gutted, convinced that Louis already left. But then he spots him at a table near the back, slipping into his coat, a crestfallen look on his downturned face. There’s a three-tiered stand on the table loaded down with finger sandwiches and scones, mostly untouched, and a teapot and two fine china cups, only one filled with tea. Louis hadn’t lied. He had been waiting for Harry.

Louis is looking down at his shoes and he nearly runs into Harry in his haste to leave. He stares up at him, bewildered, as if emerging from a nightmare. “I didn’t think you were coming,” he says softly.

“I’m sorry. I just got your note.”

Louis nods and smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “It’s okay. You’re here now.” Harry follows Louis back to his table in the corner and sits down across from him, shrugging out of his coat.

In the flickering firelight, Louis looks impossibly young, features blurred into softness. His hair is tucked back into a gray beanie and his jumper’s a size too large and he keeps pushing the sleeves up as they slide down over his hands. The urge to reach out and stroke the smooth inseam of Louis’ wrist is nearly overwhelming and Harry has to tuck his hands under his thighs to stop himself. He can feel the raised scars on his legs through his jeans, but he doesn’t mind them as much as he used to. They’re just a part of him, like any other, a sign that he’d lived and not just that – but survived.

“Do you fancy some tea? We could get a fresh pot. Scones are a bit dodgy though. I wouldn’t bother with them honestly,” Louis says nervously, fiddling with his sleeves. Harry wants to crawl inside his jumper with him and while away the winter there.

“I’m okay. I just ate. What did you want to talk about?”

“Getting right to the punch then,” Louis sighs, visibly deflating. He picks idly at the remaining crumbs of scone on his plate. “Listen, I don’t know what Zayn’s told you, but it’s – it’s all true. I know that’s not what you’re expecting me to say but – I was awful to him. I broke his heart.”

Harry stares at Louis, trying to regain the gift of speech. His dinner sits heavily in his gut, pinning him to the chair. He wants to get up and leave, but at the same time he feels paralyzed in place. Luckily, Louis starts talking again so he’s spared from making a difficult decision.

“My mum was best friends with Stan’s mum in college. They both unexpectedly got pregnant at the same time - when they were nineteen. So Stan and I have been friends pretty much from the moment we were born. I think,” Louis stops to take a sip of his tea. “I think he was always a bit jealous of me. I know that sounds weird to say – but things were always easy for me – my mum’s family had money and his didn’t. I was really good at sports and acting and he was sh*t at them. I was funny and outgoing so I had a lot of friends and he was shy and introverted. Wow, I’m really coming across as a poncey git here,” he chuckles to himself, but there’s no humor in his laugh.

“Stan was always overweight. Which, I mean, kids teased him about and I always stood up for him, but he never seemed too bothered by it. Not ‘til he started liking girls. And they all liked me. I tried to date girls for a while – it just seemed like the thing to do – but most of my relationships were short-lived and we ended up being better as friends than boyfriend-girlfriend. It wasn’t ‘til I met Zayn that I started to suspect I might have like – feelings – for other guys.” Louis swallows, fiddling with some sugar packets on the table.

“And nothing scared me more. I mean, I figured my mum wouldn’t care all that much, she might even have suspected at some points…but she was always proud of me. No matter what. But Stan – all the teasing made him hard and he was kind of…well, a bully. He didn’t feel good about himself so he picked on other kids, tried to bring them down so he could feel better, in control...I’d heard him call others guys fa*gs or poofs or benders before, even guys that weren’t, guys that just happened to look in the wrong direction in the changing room at the wrong time. So of course I couldn’t tell him when I started to – when Zayn and I started to see each other. I lived in daily fear that Stan would find out. I knew that if he did, he wouldn’t hesitate to drop me and that he would turn all the others against me. All of our friends were afraid of him.”

The shop owner comes over with a fresh pot of tea and takes the old one, giving Harry a warm smile that he only half returns. “Thanks,” Harry nods to her before she disappears back behind the counter. When Harry glances back at Louis, his head is in his hands. Harry pours them both some tea, fixing Louis’ the way he likes – milk first, no sugar - and then fixes his own – sweet and dark.

“Thanks,” Louis mumbles as he takes a sip without waiting for it to cool. He winces at the burn but swallows it down, eyes watering slightly.

“So…I’m guessing Stan found out then?” Harry ventures.

Louis nods. “Yeah. Stan came over after Zayn went home that night – when we – when we first had sex…I left my phone in my bedroom when I went to the loo and when I came back, Stan was looking through my pictures.” Louis swallows heavily. “I had pictures of Zayn – um – he was wearing – I don’t want to say in case you don’t know-”

“A dress?” Harry supplies. He thinks it’s odd that after everything Louis did to Zayn, he’s still so protective of the boy’s secrets. Nothing seems to fit about his story. If he had really broken Zayn’s heart, then why was he still trying to defend him?

Louis blushes, but looks relieved. “Yeah, I guess he told you then. He was wearing like a bra and panties, actually, but, yeah…same idea. At the time, it was just fun and sexy and spontaneous. It made him feel good and I liked how he looked. But of course, Stan didn’t see it that way. He flipped out, called me every name in the book. Said he couldn’t have a fa*g for a best friend…He told me if I didn’t break up with Zayn, he would send the pictures to the whole school and I – I knew him – I knew he would and I couldn’t do that to Zayn…”

“You were trying to protect him,” Harry says softly, as Louis nods, a tear speeding down his face.

“I really did love him…It was the worst thing I’ve ever had to do in my life. When Zayn came up to our table in the canteen the next day, Stan and everyone was there, so I just told him the first lie that came to mind. I said it was all a bet. I – I humiliated him – in front of everyone. I still remember his face – I’ll remember it until I die – it was like I could see his heart breaking.” Louis wobbles slightly like he’s on the verge of collapse. “I thought maybe – if I was a total asshole – if I made myself out to be a monster, it would hurt him less…in the long run.”

“Louis,” Harry reaches out and holds Louis’ hand across the table. “What you did was wrong, but you were cornered. It wasn’t fair.”

“I could’ve told the truth. I was just scared about what people would think and of having no friends and of Zayn’s secret getting out to the whole school. I - I cried so much over him and he’ll never know. It was like pulling my own heart out and stomping on it.”

Harry scootches his chair round to the other side of the table so he’s sitting next to Louis. Without hesitation, Louis collapses into Harry’s chest, fingers digging into Harry’s hoodie as he sobs into his neck. Harry’s heart hurts as Louis shakes apart in his arms. It’s been two years, but the wound is obviously still fresh in his mind, and it’s most likely the first time he’s admitted the truth to someone. And that Louis should choose to unburden to Harry – of all people - that had to mean something, didn’t it?

But Harry can’t think of that now. He tugs Louis’ beanie off and strokes his hair as the boy comes down and puts aside whatever he’s feeling for the moment. Harry’s worried he’s been a terribly selfish person – so absorbed in his own problems that he’d been unwilling or unable to properly see the people around him – like Zayn and Louis and Alma. And he’s so sorry for that now – because he’d never realized that by shutting himself off – he wasn’t just depriving himself, but others.

Louis calms down after a time and pulls away from Harry, mopping at his puffy face with a wad of napkins and taking a tiny sip of tea. Harry strokes his thumb over Louis’ hand where it’s resting on the table. “Why didn’t you ever tell him the truth?”

Louis shrugs, defeated. “Enough time passed and I felt like it didn’t matter anymore. Zayn and I were finally friends again and I didn’t want to do anything to ruin that.”

Harry nudges Louis with his knee. “You should tell him. He deserves to know.”

“He deserves a lot more that that,” Louis says, hanging his head.

“Hey,” Harry lifts Louis’ face up by his chin. His eyes are so big and so startlingly blue – it’s like the whole ocean is contained inside them. “Don’t beat yourself up. You did what you could with what you had. There’s no shame in that.”

“You’re not – you’re not angry with me?” Louis stammers.

Harry shakes his head, giving Louis’ thigh a reassuring squeeze. “I should have asked you in the first place and got the whole story.”

Louis finally smiles for real, his whole face lighting up. “Do you want to maybe go somewhere?” he asks timidly, tracing his finger around the rim of his teacup. “I just – I don’t want to go home yet. Maybe – maybe we could just – drive – for a little while.”

“I’d like that.”

They don’t talk much in the car, but Louis’ free hand is holding Harry’s over the gearstick, and that’s nice. Well, more than nice. But Harry’s trying not to think about it too much. If he’s learned anything in his life, it’s that things that seem too good to be true usually are. So he’s just trying to just enjoy the time he has with Louis, trying to be grateful for the tiny window Louis has provided him into his life.

Louis lets Harry man the radio – giving him the impression that it’s not a privilege he affords to just anyone - so Harry queues up a lot of quiet, late-night driving music on his Ipod. Louis teases him for some of it – what’s this hipster rubbish, Styles? – but other songs he begrudgingly sings along to. And Louis has actually got quite a nice voice. Harry read somewhere that you can’t hear people’s accents when they sing, but that’s not the case with Louis. In fact, he finds himself watching Louis’ mouth move when he sings and it’s like he can see the accent on Louis’ lips.

When Harry sings along with Rihanna’s Stay, he feels Louis quietly watching him, and when their eyes meet over the console it gives him an odd swooping sensation in his stomach. He bites his lip, suddenly embarrassed, and glances away out the window.

“Don’t stop,” Louis says, almost in a whisper. Harry’s voice is trembling a bit when he picks up the tune again, but Louis’ squeezes his hand encouragingly and he’s soon at full volume. When the song finally ends, Louis is looking at him with something like fondness on his face, and it makes Harry blush all over.

Louis looks on the verge of speaking when Harry catches sight of something streaking across his peripheral vision and turns forward to face to the windshield. They’re out past the edge of town now, where houses give way to fields and farms and the darkness outside the car is complete. Except for the sky, which is like an upside-down sieve, with the light of Heaven leaking through the holes in the night.

“Louis! Look,” Harry shouts excitedly, pointing as a shooting star streaks across sky. A second one quickly follows and Louis glides over to the shoulder, shifting the car in park.

“What are you doing?” Harry asks.

Louis rolls down the car windows and turns up the radio, grabbing some blankets from the backseat.“Come on. Our science teacher told us about this. It’s the Orionids meteor shower.”

Harry gets out of the car, stretching his long legs and popping his back. The road is deserted in both directions, so he’s in no danger of getting hit.

Louis has already laid a blanket out over the hood of the car and he pats the spot next to him. Harry crawls up beside him, the still-running engine warm under the hood as he lies down next to Louis. Louis twines their hands together and Harry smiles up at him, before redirecting his attention to the sky. The stars are falling in bunches now, raining down like handfuls of fiery confetti. Harry thinks it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever witnessed.

But then he glances over at Louis. Louis isn’t watching the sky – he’s not even pretending to be. He’s watching Harry. His expression is soft and fond and the light of the stars is reflected back in his eyes, like tiny silver fish swimming in two dark pools of water. Harry feels like he’s been punched in the sternum. Louis’ beauty rears its head at the most unexpected times and it’s absolutely devastating. Harry gives him a timid smile and Louis beams back at him.

He shivers, but it’s not the wind that’s made him do so. Nonetheless, Louis raises an eyebrow. “Cold?”

“A little,” Harry lies.

“Come ‘ere,” Louis holds his arms out and Harry scoots closer, until Louis has his arm wrapped around Harry’s waist. It’s funny because Harry’s physically much larger than Louis is, but Louis always ends up being the one holding him. And oddly enough, in Louis’ arms Harry doesn’t feel giant and clumsy and unwieldy as he usually does – he feels safe and small and secure - swaddled as tight as a newborn.

Harry’s suddenly hyper-aware of every part of his body where it’s pressed against Louis’, of the heat of Louis’ skin radiating through his pale blue jumper and the light, but insistent pressure of Louis’ small hand where its cupping his hip. The song abruptly changes on the radio and there’s a moment of silence where they’re just staring into each other’s eyes and then the next song starts up and Louis’ lips are suddenly pressed to his.

At first, their mouths barely move – they just breathe each other in - as Louis lightly brushes his lips over Harry’s. Harry’s heart is beating so hard and so fast it feels like it’s going to beat out of his chest, but he can feel Louis’ too, echoing his, and the thought causes him to relax enough to surge up into Louis’ lips, increasing the pressure of their joined mouths. Harry’s shoulders meld into the heat of the car’s hood as Louis’ tongue moves past his lips, running over his teeth, tangling with his tongue.

Harry’s so enthralled, so lost in the slow, building heat of the kiss, that he doesn’t realize Louis has shifted until he’s on top of him, straddling Harry’s hips. They part momentarily and Louis gazes down at him, silhouetted against a night sky swimming with stars and Harry thinks - this is it, this is what love looks like - and then Louis’ mouth is crashing down on his and he’s drowning in it.

Harry touches Louis timidly at first – unsure of the rules, of what’s acceptable – just lightly resting his hands on the other boy’s hips as their kissing grows increasingly heated. But then Louis runs his hands down Harry’s chest and Harry’s hands reflexively tighten on Louis and the resulting moan Louis releases into Harry’s mouth gives him confidence to explore further. Harry runs his hands down Louis’ back, sliding down to firmly squeeze his arse and it’s everything he dreamed it would be and more. Louis whines into his mouth and the sound goes straight to Harry’s co*ck.

And then Louis’ hand is there, squeezing Harry’s heated length through his jeans. Harry gasps and Louis pulls their mouths apart long enough to smirk at him. No one’s ever touched Harry there before – well except his mum when he was a baby and she changed his nappies – but Harry is definitely not thinking of his mum right now. He’s about the furthest from thinking about his mum that a boy can be. Louis’ touch is electric and Harry’s unconsciously bucking up into it.

“Are you always like this?” Louis laughs.

Harry blushes and buries his face into Louis’ woolen jumper, trying to calm himself down. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I didn’t mean it as a bad thing, love,” Louis says, running the hand not gripping Harry over his curls. “It’s – God – you’re just so responsive. It’s so f*cking sexy.”

Harry grunts as Louis’ hand circles his erection and gives it a firm squeeze that nearly has him shooting off in his jeans. He’s trying so hard not to cum – but Louis’ hand is on him, on his dick - and it’s taking every ounce of his concentration not to.

“Can we – uh – can we stop a sec?” he asks timidly.

It’s the last thing he wants really. He’s more turned on than he’s ever been, wants Louis to pull him out of his jeans and finish him off then and there, but there’s that niggling voice at the back of his mind, not letting him fully enjoy it. He wants it – he wants the kissing and the handholding and all the other good stuff that comes along with – and he wants it with Louis – only he can’t stop thinking that he can’t. Because last he checked, Louis is with Eleanor. And he’s just Louis’ dirty little secret.

Louis’ eyes darken momentarily, but he puts on a chipper smile. “Yeah, of course. Can we still cuddle?”

Harry nods and Louis tugs him closer, holding him tightly as Harry’s heartbeat slows and his erection subsides. Louis is quietly watching the stars fall and Harry’s face is buried into Louis’ neck and he smells so good and this feels so right and before Harry quite knows what’s happening, he’s crying. He’s trying to keep quiet, but his shoulders are shaking and it’s only a matter of seconds before Louis notices. He pulls Harry back by the shoulders, staring into his face with growing alarm.

“Harry, oh God, what’s wrong? Did I go too fast? Did you not want to-?” Louis looks horrified.

“No – I,” Harry pulls back, hugging his own body, as if he’s trying to keep himself from falling to bits. “You’ve got a girlfriend, Louis,” Harry chokes. “And I know it’s not a big deal to you – I know you’ve done this all before - but it’s my first time doing that with anyone. And I wanted it to be different…to be special. And I just – I really like you,” he sobs. He swipes angrily at his face, hating to cry in front of Louis, to be perceived as weak. “Can you please just take me home?”

“Yeah, of course. Of course,” Louis mumbles, gathering up the blankets. And that’s it – it’s over before it’s started – Harry’s completely blown any chance he’s had. He feels like kicking himself. Why couldn’t he just be satisfied with what Louis had to offer him? He was lucky to even get that much. He’s not Marcel any longer – not the shy, awkward boy who hid himself away from the world - but in that moment, he feels just as small, maybe even smaller.

The drive home is silent and awkward. Harry’s not crying anymore, but Louis’ jaw is clenched and his hands are white-knuckled on the steering wheel as if he’s trying to strangle it. Harry turns his face toward the window and pretends to be asleep because he can’t bear to look at him, can’t bear to see the disappointment and frustration on his face.

When they’re finally in his driveway, Harry can’t get out of the car quickly enough. Only Louis has a hold of his wrist. “Harry, I know I don’t deserve it, but I just – I need some time…can you give me that?”

Harry has no idea what Louis is blathering on about. Time to what? He’d spent all week trying to get back into Harry’s good graces and now he wants time away from him? It makes just about as much sense as anything Louis has done – the Valentine, lying to Zayn, the kissing, and of course, running back to Eleanor when all is said and done. Harry wants to forgive him – wants to believe him – he really does – but if anything has gotten him through a sh*tty childhood and a mediocre adolescence, it’s a sense of self-preservation.

“Whatever you want Louis,” he says coldly, wrenching his wrist free and jumping out of the car.

Harry doesn’t look back, but he can feel the heat of Louis’ gaze on the back of his neck like a sunburn and it’s not ‘til he’s in his room that he finally hears Louis back out of his driveway and pull away into the night.

He brings a hand up to his mouth and briefly touches his own lips, feeling the ghost of Louis’ kiss. It was only minutes ago, and if he closes his eyes, he can still feel the heat of the other’s boy’s mouth, like a promise. Too bad it was one he never intended to keep.

Chapter 7

Chapter Text

I hear you calling in the dead of night

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

***

Harry spends ten minutes that night rifling through the contents of his bookshelf until he finds it. Alma gave him the brown leather journal two Christmases ago with a card that read: maybe it’s time you started writing your own story.

He hadn’t been ready then, and come to think of it, he’s not sure he’s ready now, but Harry opens the journal nonetheless, giving the spine a satisfying crack. For a minute, he just stares at the sheet of lined paper in front of him, chewing thoughtfully on the end of his biro. The blank page is daunting, but it’s also – it’s also exciting. It’s the start of something. He can feel it. He can feel it like he’s never felt anything before. Not in a long, long time.

It’s not even about Louis anymore – though he likes the boy so much he can barely breathe sometimes – it’s about getting himself right. Because how can he hope for Louis – or anyone – to love him when he can’t even love himself?

Harry’s been waiting his whole life for a knight to come and rescue him – for someone to slay his dragons – to save him from his past and moreover, from himself. He never stopped to consider that maybe he was the one with the keys to the castle – that all he had to do was strap on some armor and walk out the front door. He had the ability to save himself all along.

Harry feels stupid and angry with himself when he realizes he’s wasted so much time. He’s been sitting around, waiting for a sign to fall out of the sky and strike him on the head – like Newton’s prophetic apple – something to say: this is it. Your life starts now.

Harry never realized that this was it – his life had already started – whether he wanted it to or not. This was his life running by him – the parties he’d never gone to, the people he’d never befriended, the crushes he’d never kissed, the times he’d never gotten drunk and woken up on a neighbor’s front lawn – all because of that niggling voice inside his head that told him he wasn’t good enough, that he wasn’t worth it. All because he told himself that this period of his life was just a layover on the way to the real thing. All the opportunities he’d never taken were like trains passing him by on the way to other places and he was the idiot standing at the station, watching them go. Thinking, I’ll just take the next one.

But it had gone on like this for ages and he had still never taken that first, crucial step. And if the past few weeks hadn’t been a sign, he doesn’t know what would be. First, Liam running over his cat and then waking up in Louis’ Tomlinson’s bed and later, walking in on Zayn Malik in a dress and then, Louis’ scrawled note in his favorite book and of course the kissing, the kissing, the kissing...

In one way or another, Louis and Zayn and the rest of them had all tried to dig Harry free of his past, but he’d resisted their efforts, scared that they were trying to turn him into someone he was not. He’d shrunk back into old habits, into his shell, because it was comfortable there. Because safety seemed preferable to change. Because he was afraid of actually feeling something. Because if you never tried with people, if you never cared, you never got hurt. But he doesn’t want to wake up in ten years and think, what if? What if I’d taken a chance? He doesn’t want to regret all the time he spent locked away when he could have been living, experiencing things.

Harry remembers when he was a little boy and his parents were fighting or his dad was yelling at him, he used to close his eyes. Because if he couldn’t see it happening, it was like it wasn’t there. And he thought maybe if he closed his eyes enough, it would all disappear. That he would disappear. But it never happened. He’s still here. And he’s tired of closing his eyes to the world, of burying his feeling away in a shoebox under his bed, of getting dressed with his back to the mirror because he’s so scared to look at himself.

All his life he’d blamed his parents for the way he was – his dad for not loving him the way he should have, his mum for being complicit in the abuse, his grandmother for being a horrible, frigid old woman who’d cut her own family off. And yes, he’d had a sh*t start. There was no denying that. But it’s on him now. He’s responsible for his own life and he’s never been more scared or excited as he is the moment he comes to that realization.

And so he writes a list. It’s not perfect, but it’s a start - and above all - it’s his. He draws a line down the middle of the paper, bisecting the page into two columns. On the left side he writes: Things I can and on the right: Things I can’t. After thinking it over a second, he carefully pens Louis’ name under the Things I can’t column. On the second page, he makes another list of all the places he’d like to travel. Then he makes a list of the things he’d like to do with his life.

Here is Harry’s life in lists. Bucket lists. Reading lists. Lists of songs. Lists of reasons. Lists why he shouldn’t. Lists why he should. Lists that shame him. Lists that make him smile. List of things he can’t. List of things he can. Lists that start at his center and roll out of him like a tongue.

Here is the room where Harry has lived the last eight years of his life. Here is the scuffed wooden desk and rigid, straight-backed chair. Here is the window with a view of the front garden. Here is the bookcase with all of the books he’s read and all the ones he’s yet to read. Here is the closet. Here are the shadows of clothes hanging still and patient in the darkness, waiting for his hands to take them off hangers. Here on the bedside table are his glasses, smudged with fingerprints and held together with tape. Here is the shoebox under the bed. Here is the Valentine from Louis and the notes from Alma.

Here is his life. And it’s not perfect, but it’s his own.

When Harry finally passes out, fingertips stained dark with ink, he sleeps the heavy sleep of the accomplished, of the people who write lists and make plans, the doers of the world. He doesn’t have bad dreams as he once did. And he wakes with the sun instead of to his alarm for once and feels better than he has in ages.

Harry knows he’s not going to change all at once. The only way for it to stick is to do it in small, manageable increments. He thinks if he can change just one thing a day, that’s enough. He starts with breakfast – because that seems the easiest and most obvious – cooking himself egg on toast instead of his usual bowl of Weetabix.

He even makes a little dish of scrambled eggs for Pancake and laughs as she experimentally noses at them before deeming them edible.

Gemma gives Harry an incredulous look as he’s scrubbing the pan at the kitchen sink, cheerfully humming a tune under his breath. “Listen, Mar – Harry,” she corrects herself. “If you’re having some sort of identity crisis or breakdown-”

“I’m fine,” Harry laughs, giving her belly an affectionate pat. “Just felt like toast today.”

School’s much the same. Harry goes to his classes and takes notes and returns an armload of overdue books to the library, where Alma mistakes Louis as the reason for his upbeat mood.

Harry’s not quite as friendless as he once was – he eats lunch in the art room with Zayn instead of in the boy’s loo – so that’s something, but he hasn’t quite worked himself up to the canteen yet. Louis smiles at him in the hallway and Harry smiles back, but Louis is still with Eleanor and that’s – well, that’s something Harry’s coming to terms with. (Mostly through bad, angsty poetry penned in his journal in the middle of the night.)

They hang out more outside of school too. Harry and Zayn are regulars on the sidelines with Niall at football matches, though Zayn spends most of that time disappearing to smoke and coming back with purpling hickeys on his throat. Harry doesn’t stop getting that feeling that it’s all going to go away, that they’re going to leave once they see the real him, but it happens a lot less frequently. In the coming weeks, Harry even becomes something of a fixture at the Tomlinson residence. On Saturdays, he babysits so Jay and Mark can have a date night and Louis can go party with Eleanor. And Wednesday nights, while Louis is at football practice and Jay and Mark take Fizzy for treatment, Harry cooks the girls’ dinner and helps them with their homework.

Harry finds himself once again lost in routines and is startled to find how normal it all feels – adding people into his life, opening himself up. Louis’ sisters adore him and they’re easy to adore right back. Their seemingly limitless affection and endless curiosity for life is so strange and wonderful to Harry, who spent his childhood startling like a skittish cat, trying to hide bruises from well-meaning teachers and stuffing his piss-soaked sheets to the bottom of the laundry basket so his dad wouldn’t find out.

On Wednesday nights, after Harry finishes giving the twins their baths and putting them to bed, he fixes a plate for Louis. Louis usually strolls in at half eight, grass-stained and sweaty and heads straight upstairs to shower. When he comes down, fringe damp and sweet smelling, changed into comfy sweats and a jumper, they sit on the couch and eat dinner together. Most of the time, they don’t say much, content to sit and watch telly in companionable silence. Sometimes, Louis’ heavy head finds its way to Harry’s shoulder or his socked feet end up tucked under Harry’s thighs for warmth and he usually ends up falling asleep during whatever they’re watching, but Harry doesn’t mind much. In fact, Wednesday is fast becoming Harry’s favorite part of the week.

Which is not to say things are perfect. Louis has been distant and preoccupied since they kissed – like something is constantly weighing on him – but Harry considers their tentative friendship a sort of progress and doesn’t press. He remembers the night of the meteor shower – remembers Louis asking him for time – and figures Louis will come to him once he’s ready.

One Wednesday, Harry’s putting a baking pan of stuffed peppers into the oven for their dinner when Louis comes limping into the kitchen. There’s blood running down his leg, soaking into his rolled-down sock and cleat and he grimaces with each hopping step.

“What happened? Are you okay?” Harry blurts, nearly burning himself on the metal grate inside the oven as he hastily slams the door.

“’S Nothing. I’m fine,” Louis says through gritted teeth, leaning on the counter for support.

“You’re not fine. You’re bleeding all over the goddamn floor,” Harry huffs. “Just – just sit on the couch and try not to bleed out while I’m gone. I’m gonna get some stuff to clean you up.” Louis’ mouth is open to protest, but Harry’s already gone and never hears what he was about to say.

Harry’s intimate enough with the upstairs medicine cabinet by now – from the day Phoebe and Daisy covered themselves with Princess plasters and the time he needed a nail scissor to get gum out of Lottie’s hair and he pretty much exhausted the bottle of Paracetamol one night when he had a screaming headache and the twins refused to go bed – so he finds what he needs fairly quickly. When he comes back downstairs, Louis is sitting on the couch in the living room, with his leg up on the coffee table and his head resting on the back cushion, eyes closed.

When Harry swabs some rubbing alcohol over his knee, Louis winces and his eyes shoot open. “Ow,” he yelps. “Watch it.”

“Oh come on, it’s not so bad. I used to do this all the time as a kid-” Harry rambles, before he realizes what he’s said. Harry forgets sometimes that he didn’t have a normal childhood – that it wasn’t normal to automatically search out all the hiding spots and exits in a room or to know how to clean and bandage a cut or cover a black eye with makeup.

Louis’ breath hitches audibly in his throat. “Harry-” he says, his voice soft and pained.

“Sorry – I didn’t – just forget it. What happened to your knee anyway?”

“My ex best friend,” Louis rolls his eyes.

“Stan did this?” Harry asks, carefully searching Louis’ face. Louis is biting his lip as he watches Harry clean and disinfect his knee, but he doesn’t meet Harry’s concerned gaze.

“Are you really that surprised?” Louis asks wearily as Harry winds a bandage around his leg. “He’s got a vendetta out for me now.”

“Louis, I - I didn’t mean to cause any trouble – ”

I mean, it’s not as if Harry’s face ran into Stan’s fist or anything, but he knows how long Stan and Louis have been friends and he still feels a bit sh*t about how everything’s turned out.

“Harry – you’re not – this isn’t your fault, okay?”

But Harry’s only too relieved to hear the timer buzz and rushes off to get dinner out of the oven. He comes back and plops an ice-pack on Louis’ knee and hands him his plate and the remote. “You pick tonight.”

Halfway through About a Boy, Louis’ head sags against Harry’s shoulder and he lets out a world-weary sigh. He still smells faintly of sweat and dirt and grass and Harry inhales him deeply. He runs a finger over the faint tracery of veins on the inside of Louis’ arm. Louis’ skin is winter pale and the blue veins beneath it are like small rivers encased in ice. Harry wants to press his lips to the inside of Louis’ small-boned wrist and see if his skin is as cold as it looks. But he swallows down the urge and returns his eyes to the movie. It’s one of his favorites, but he can’t concentrate on what’s happening onscreen. He keeps feeling Louis shift beside him, keeps hearing the soft little sighs he lets slip when he thinks Harry’s not paying attention.

“Lou? I know it’s none of my business, but is everything all right with you?” he asks quietly.

Louis is silent for a few beats too long and Harry wonders if it’s possible to fall asleep that quickly.

But then Louis exhales, pinching the bridge of his nose as if warding off a headache. “Harry, is it okay if we don’t talk about this now?”

“Yeah. Yeah sure. Of course. Okay.” Harry turns his attention back to the movie. He feels like crying all of a sudden, though he can’t say why. He takes a puff of his inhaler and feels Louis snuggle further into his side, his hair tickling Harry’s chin.

Another twenty minutes pass in silence and Harry can’t help but add so softly he’s not sure Louis will hear, “I just want you to be happy, Louis.” And then he does kiss him, on the soft skin on the inside of his wrist, where it smells faintly of his cologne.

Louis bites his lip, eyes flicking away so it looks as if he’s speaking to the table lamp and not Harry when he finally responds. “I’m just not sure that’s possible. For me. Right now.”

Harry wants to argue that happiness is a choice sometimes, but he can’t speak around the growing lump in his throat. He thinks it’s the first time he’s properly loved anyone that wasn’t family, and completely unselfishly, without expecting anything in return. He knows that if Louis chose El over him, if that was what would make the light in his eyes swim the way it had the night of the meteor shower, he would let him go. He would make his peace with it. He would do whatever it took for Louis’ smile to reach his eyes again.

Louis stands abruptly, wobbling on his weak knee like a newborn colt. His face is a mask of pain and his eyes are dark and hazy, like twin moons obscured by grey clouds. “I should go to bed.”

He makes for the doorway, but he doesn’t make it far before his leg crumples beneath him. Harry thinks he’s never moved so fast in his life. He’s out of his seat and bent at the waist, just managing to catch Louis mid-swoon before he brains himself on the coffee table. For a second, their faces are mere inches apart and he’s staring into Louis’ eyes, which look so startled and scared. They’re both flushed and breathing hard and Harry wonders if they’re about to kiss. Louis’ breath smells faintly sweet and nutty from the pistachio sorbet Harry bought for dessert and Harry wants to taste him more than he’s ever wanted anything.

Louis finally breaks the stalemate with a smirking smile. “You can let me go now, Styles.”

But Harry doesn’t. He slips one arm around the back of Louis’ knees and the other around his waist and hoists him up. “Unhand me, you brute,” Louis laughs, hitting Harry’s chest.

Harry rolls his eyes. “Just let me carry you. You’re going to fall again and break your stupid face,” he sighs.

“My face is not stupid,” Louis pouts, but he’s biting back a grin as Harry starts up the staircase.

“You know this is very emasculating,” Louis says, when they’re nearly at the landing, though judging from the look on his face he seems to be quite enjoying himself.

“I’ve just spent all evening with three preteen girls. Just be glad I didn’t use the princess plasters on you,” Harry grunts.

Louis studies Harry’s face carefully, which is a bit disconcerting when they’re this close up. He hopes he hasn’t got any bogies in his nose or undiscovered spots on his chin. “Harold,” Louis says, punctuating his words with a poke to Harry’s chest, “I’m not some swooning heroine, you know. I think you’ve read one too many romance novels.”

“Says the guy who made me watch Titantic three times last week,” Harry snorts, flopping Louis none-too-gracefully on top of his covers, cutting off his protest about the youth of today not appreciating classic cinema. Louis’ room is dark and his blue eyes are shining as he runs his tongue over his bottom lip to wet it. Harry wants to crawl inside him, wants to press their skin together as close as he can, but instead he forces his hands into his pockets.

“Are you going to change me into my jammies and tuck me in?” Louis asks, the mischievousness of his question only slightly undermined by the dark vein of lust in his voice.

Harry pretends to contemplate it for a minute, though the idea of taking Louis out of his sweaty football kit is only too appealing. Preferably with his teeth. “Will your mum pay me extra for that?”

“You’re an absolute menace, Harry Styles.”

“You love it,” Harry blurts out before he can stop himself. He doesn’t miss the way Louis’ face falls.

Harry stands so quickly his head spins and he nearly knocks over a shelf of Louis’ football trophies. “I should - I should go. My mum’ll be – I should go…”

“Harry?” Louis asks in a small voice as Harry is closing the door.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“I’m just – I’m sorry,” he says again, before rolling over to face away from Harry. Harry sighs but he keeps turning over the words in his mind as he calls his mum for a ride. Sorry for what?

Harry never knew his school had a literary magazine, but one afternoon when he’s waiting for Zayn to finish up in the art studio so he can get a ride home, he spots a crumpled copy left behind on someone’s stool. He finds himself immersed for the next twenty minutes and doesn’t look up until Zayn splashes him with water where he’s rinsing his hands at the slop sink. “Ready to go, space cadet?”

“Oh, uh, yeah.” Harry slips the magazine into his satchel and pulls on his coat, receiving Zayn’s spare helmet to his chest with an affronted grunt.

The writing in the magazine isn’t spectacular on the whole, just amateur student stuff really, but there are one or two hidden gems, including a really touching poem Perrie wrote about her Gran passing.

Harry can’t stop thinking about the magazine on the ride home. He thinks about it as he boils water for his tea, as he cuts up an orange into wedges, as he absently scratches Pancake’s chin. He thinks about it as he struggles through his Maths homework (which he’s normally very good at). He thinks about it as he’s heating up a Cup of Noodle in the microwave later that evening (Ed and Gemma are baby furniture shopping and his mum’s doing inventory at the store). And he’s still thinking about as he lies down to go to sleep that night.

Only he can’t sleep. He gets up and pads over to his desk, flicking on his lamp and cracking open his laptop. He’s in no mood to bother with putting contacts in, so he slides on his glasses, blinking blearily at the bright screen. He browses his Tumblr dashboard for a bit and checks his email (which is mostly junk anyway) but it doesn’t fill the void the way it once did. There are images forming in Harry’s mind, blooming like orchids in a hothouse, and his fingers twitch over the keys. He scrolls through his Itunes library and pulls up The Paper Kites EP, setting the volume on low. Then, he opens up a new Word doc and begins to type.

When she was young and the operation was still in its infancy, Bea viewed it as a sort of party trick – a magician pulling a dove from his breast coat pocket. She liked to watch the awe on her friends’ faces as she unbuttoned the serrated line beneath the pink bud of her breast and took out what they all had inside them, but had never seen.

It’s a magical realism piece about a girl growing up in a society where people’s hearts are removable. Harry’s not sure where the idea came from, but the more he writes the more it feels right. Its slow going at first, but soon the words are flowing out of him like he’s trying to staunch a gushing wound, spilling out over the keyboard. He gets lost in a sort of fugue state where the only things that exist are his laptop and his fingers tapping away at the keys. The words flow through like he’s a conduit, like it’s coming from somewhere else and moving through him. He’s not even aware of the temperature of the room around him, of whether it’s hot or cold. The same six songs keep looping on his Itunes, but he doesn’t even notice let alone bother to change it.

When her mother closed the door, Bea tiptoed to her dresser and took down her heart. When Bea wasn’t housing it, it resided in a mason jar of special fluid that kept it from drying out or rotting. Which is not to say it didn’t shrink. The longer Bea’s heart went outside of her, the smaller it got. In fifteen years time, her heart would shrivel to the size of a walnut, in twenty to the size of a bean. And when she finally took her last breath, it would as small as an eyelash.

In the glow of her nightlight, Bea’s heart hung suspended like an iris in the jar’s eye, watching her. She carried it to her bed and lay down beside it. Her heart pressed its ventricles to the glass. The little hollow inside her ached.

The whole process of writing feels cathartic, like Harry’s sapping the poison from a snake bite. When he finally glances up from his laptop, it’s nearly time to get up for school. He saves his work and goes downstairs to fix himself a cup of tea, the ordinary objects in his kitchen suddenly taking on new gravity. Taking his cup and a rug off his bed, he crawls out onto the roof, feeling like he’s emerging from a cocoon, changed. He watches the sun rise over the rooftops of Holmes Chapel for the first time in years and he feels well…he feels happy.

Harry polishes the piece for the next week and drops it into Ms. Burnes’ mailbox on Friday without second-guessing himself. He doesn’t say anything about it to his family and friends – doesn’t even hint at it – because he’s not even sure it will end up running in the issue. He’d asked Perrie about it before he turned it in and she’d said they were quite selective. They probably won’t even pick him. It will probably take several tries before he’s written anything worthwhile. Probably.

Harry feels nauseous about it for the next week, though his social calendar’s filling up enough that he manages not to think about it for short periods at a time. Besides babysitting for the Tomlinsons and regularly attending the school’s footie matches, Harry’s also started volunteering program at Alma’s suggestion. She’s friends with the town librarian, Mr. Frank, and they run a reading circle on Tuesday nights where Harry reads books to nursery age children. It’s amazing to see their faces light up as he reads, to hear them beg him to read a particular story again, to instill a love of reading into kids so young. He’d never thought of himself as someone who could make a difference in other people’s lives – he’d been trying so hard just to get through his own – but suddenly he can’t think of anything else.

By the time Wednesday rolls around again, Harry’s nearly forgotten about his submission to the school magazine. Nearly. He’s making chicken breasts wrapped in Parma ham, simmered in herbed butter and covered with a layer of crispy, melted mozzarella for dinner. It’s one of his better dishes and he’s excited to try it out on the girls – and well – Louis too, really. Louis is out of practice for the week with a minor tear in his meniscus and Harry sort of – kind of – expects it means he and Louis will get to hang out.

Harry’s armed with groceries and a big bag of art supplies he borrowed from Zayn – he’d spent free-period surfing Pinterest in the library for crafts to do with the girls – and he’s got a few ideas narrowed down. All in all, Harry’s looking forward to a quiet evening in - dinner, homework, a quick craft and then baths and bed. Only that’s not what he gets.

When he arrives at the Tomlinson’s, he spots Eleanor’s familiar red coupe parked in the driveway and feels a sensation in his chest like his heart’s being gripped by a fist.

Harry’s only just raised his hand to knock on the door when it flies inward, Jay and Mark and Fizzy spilling out onto the stoop. Fizzy gives Harry a tight hug, arms clinging around his middle, and doesn’t let him go until he assures her he has something special planned for them on Saturday. He’s been thinking of taking the girls to the aquarium for a while now (he’s actually never been to one himself) and thanks to babysitting, he finally has enough cash to splurge on it.

Jay gives Harry a harried smile and smears a lipstick-heavy kiss onto his cheek, which he scrubs at with the edge of his sleeve as politely as he can manage. “Sorry. We changed our appointment time and we’re running late –” she explains as she drags Fizzy off toward the car.

Harry lets himself in and puts his groceries away into the fridge. The heat in the house is stifling and he strips off his sweater, hanging it on the back of one of the kitchen chairs. The girls are already at the table doing their homework and Harry boils some tea and makes a plate of cut up bananas with peanut butter for them before sitting down to help Lottie with her Maths.

There’s no sign of Louis or Eleanor all afternoon and Harry isn’t sure whether to be grateful or disappointed. One the one hand, it means no lingering awkwardness, but on the other hand it means Louis is with her, alone in his bedroom, which can only mean one thing.

Luckily, Harry’s distracted with the girls’ homework and dinnertime creeps up on him quickly. Harry ties on one of Jay’s frilly aprons and is about to preheat the oven when he feels Daisy come up behind him, clinging to his leg.

“Will you ask Louis if he’ll eat with us?” she asks sweetly. Harry’s hand automatically comes to rest on her blonde head, fitting perfectly in his palm.

“Yes, please,” Phoebe whines, joining her twin’s plea. “He’s always too busy lately.”

Harry’s pretty sure he doesn’t have it in him to say no to them, what with both pairs of lovely blue eyes fixed on him, looking so very much like Louis’. He lets out a sigh. “I’ll check with him. But no promises.”

“I wouldn’t even bother,” Lottie says bitterly, not looking up from her mobile screen. “All he really cares about anymore is footie and Eleanor.”

Harry swallows around the lump in his throat. “I’m sure that’s not true, Lots.”

But Harry’s apprehensive as he goes up the stairs. Louis’ door is closed and Harry is ready to go back downstairs without bothering to knock when he hears raised voices inside.

“El, where are you going?” Louis asks, exasperated.

“Home. To use my vibrator. Because unlike you, it actually stays hard,” she snaps. Harry winces, shrinking back against the wall. His heart is pounding in his chest and he knows he should leave, that it’s rude to listen in on other people’s conversations, but he feels like a small startled animal, preferring to stay still over drawing the attention of predators with any sudden movement.

“I’m sorry. I just – just give me some time okay? I don’t know where my head’s at lately.” Louis’ voice sounds completely defeated and it makes Harry’s chest hurt and his skin feel overly tight. Why does Louis subject himself to this? He’s good looking and smart and funny and great at sports and Eleanor doesn’t seem to appreciate any of those qualities in him. She’s just using him.

You’re jealous, a small voice says at the back of his mind. Because she has him and you don’t. Harry bites the inside of his cheek hard, the pain making his eyes water slightly.

“Well I do. You’re thinking of him, aren’t you?” Eleanor asks bitingly. Harry feels like all the air’s gone out of his lungs and he clings to the doorframe for support. Him? Him who?

Louis’ next words are so soft Harry has to strain to hear them through the closed door and over the sound of his own furiously beating heart. “Maybe if I was thinking of him, I’d actually be hard,” he mumbles.

Harry doesn’t miss the distinct sound of an open palm slapping skin. He cowers back against the wall, squeezing his eyes shut. His body feels like it’s shutting down, going into that state of paralysis it used to when his dad was about to hit him. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that – ” Louis stammers, completely unhinged.

“You know, this kind of stress isn’t good for me – it isn’t good for –”

“I know. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I said that. I’m just under a lot pressure—” Louis’ voice is ragged and low, like it’s been raked over coals.

“You think I’m not? You know, there are a ton of guys who want to be with me. You think I’m happy about being stuck with one who’s completely let himself go?”

The door abruptly opens and Harry has no time to hide or get out of the way as Eleanor storms out. She’s tugging her dress back into place with one hand and carrying her shoes and purse in the other, and as she passes, she gives him a look that would curdle milk before stomping off down the stairs.

Harry finally gets his legs to cooperate and walks into Louis’ room. At first, he doesn’t see the other boy, but then he sees a small, crumpled figure leaning back against the wall by the bed. Louis is only wearing a pair of basketball shorts and his head is hanging down, wedged between his knees as his shoulders shake with sobs.

“Go away, Harry,” he says, completely without conviction.

“No,” Harry says firmly, sliding down the wall so he’s sitting beside Louis. He leaves an inch of space between their bodies just in case, fighting the instinct to put his arms around the other boy.

“I know it’s not my place and that – I don’t really understand everything that’s going on between you two – but why do you let her treat you like that?” Harry asks slowly.

Louis snorts and lifts his head to look at Harry. The skin under his eyes is red and swollen and his face is puffy, but there’s fury blazing in his blue eyes. “No, you really don’t understand,” he spits angrily.

Harry puts a tentative hand on Louis’ leg. “So tell me.”

“She’s pregnant, Harry,” Louis chokes, before letting his head drop back into his crossed arms.

Harry feels like he’s freefalling off the top of a skyscraper, the ground rushing up at him at warp speed, with nothing to stand between him and certain death. He dispenses a quick puff of his inhaler, but it doesn’t make relief flood through his chest as it normally does. It takes him a moment to get his arms to cooperate, and even when he does, they feel leaden and mechanical when he folds them around Louis.

He feels numb as Louis sobs into his shoulder, gripping the back of Harry’s shirt like he’s drowning. Harry’s heart is breaking for Louis – it really is – but it’s breaking for him too – it’s mourning the death of whatever miniscule chance he might have had with Louis. It feels like an eternity before Louis stops crying – each ragged sob ripping through Harry’s soul like tissue paper – though it’s probably only the span of a few minutes.

“You know,” Louis says, wiping the tears furiously from his face. “She was nothing before me. She was just some slag who never turned down a drug or a dude. And now she acts like her sh*t doesn’t stink.”

Harry frowns. He’s not overly fond of people using disparaging terms to describe women. Especially because he’s heard those words used by other guys to describe his sister – who’s only ever slept with Ed, who just got unlucky. If it had been some guy on Louis’ football team sleeping with everyone, he’d be a hero, not a slag. But then again, Harry’s seen the way Eleanor treats Louis firsthand, so maybe it’s forgivable, under the circ*mstances.

“Then why did you start dating her?” he asks quietly, not wanting to overstep his bounds. Louis is holding himself like he’s about to break apart, like he’s trying to keep the birds inside him from escaping.

“It was a mutually beneficial thing at first. She got to be the popular, respectable girlfriend of a footballer and I got to be – well, to be straight. Or well, give the appearance of being straight. It was Stan’s idea, you know. Eleanor’s his cousin. They’re very well off, but the family was on the verge of disinheriting her before she started seeing me. Stan thought it might be a good idea if it looked like we were dating until things with Zayn blew over. I didn’t know it was going to be two f*cking years of my life.”

Harry nods, biting his lip. “But you slept with her? You’re sleeping with her? So you must – like – her?”

“Like her? No one likes Eleanor. They’re scared of her. There’s a difference. And it was either sleep with her or be celibate all through High school – ” Louis says bitterly. Seeing the crestfallen look on Harry’s face, Louis hastens to add, “not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

“When did you – how far along is she?” Harry swallows. He still can’t wrap his mind around it. Because if he does, it means that even if what he felt that night – lying on the hood of Louis’ car beneath a shower of falling stars – was real, even if those feelings were somehow reciprocated by Louis, it no longer matters. He can’t come between Louis and a baby – between Louis and his child.

Dimly, in the back of his mind, Harry registers what a good dad Louis will be – how patience and gentle he is with his younger sisters – but somehow that only makes it worse. Because he knows that means Louis will be his best for someone else, not Harry. And he doesn’t care how selfish that is, because he’s sixteen and Louis is the first person he’s ever loved, and he’s allowed that, right? A moment of self pity?

“Remember that first football game you came to with Zayn? And we went out to dinner after?”

Harry sighs, mostly remembering the massive boner he’d gotten when Louis was sitting on his lap in the car. Absolutely pathetic. “I’m not likely to forget it.” It had been one of the most humiliating nights of Harry’s life. But also, strangely, one of the best nights too.

“She told me that night.”

“And you’re sure it’s – ” Harry trails off, leaving the next words unspoken.

“Mine? Yeah. Or so she says. Frankly, I’m inclined to believe her. She’s not willing to risk her reputation by cheating on me. I mean, people have mostly forgotten about how she used to be, but…it never really goes away, you know? The really awful thing is, we were always so careful. I mean – we’ve never had sex without a condom, ever.”

Harry tries hard not to throw up. “So…what are you going to do?”

Louis shrugs, defeated. “She wants to keep it. Not much I can do. And I can’t – I can’t become my dad, you know? I can’t walk out on him or her…I can’t leave them wondering their whole life why they weren’t good enough for me to stick around.”

Harry gives Louis a puzzled look. “Isn’t Mark – ?”

“He’s my step-dad,” Louis corrects. “He adopted me when I was little. And I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, because he’s great. He really is. He’s a better dad to me than my real dad ever was. Just…sometimes, when I feel low, I sit around and I wonder why…” Louis trails off, biting at the edge of his cuticle.

Harry takes a deep breath. “Why what?”

“Why I wasn’t enough for him to stay,” Louis says softly.

Harry exhales heavily. “When I was little, I used to wish my dad would die.” Louis’ eyes widen, mouth turning into a small ‘O’ of surprise. “Like. All the time. I used to fantasize about him falling down the stairs or passing out in his own puke and not getting up again. And wow, I’ve never said that aloud to anyone.”

“Harry—”

“The thing is – Louis, the thing is - I always felt guilty for thinking that – like there was something wrong with me. But if he’d just been the dad he should’ve been, I never would have thought those things. He failed me, okay? Not the other way around. And your dad failed you, okay? It wasn’t anything you did or didn’t do or thought – He didn’t deserve you, Louis.” Harry wants to add, and neither does she, but he keeps his mouth shut.

Louis reaches over and takes Harry’s hand, squeezing it. There are tears shining in his big blue eyes and he looks oddly beautiful in his suffering - like one of those Renaissance paintings of martyred saints. “Thank you,” Louis says softly. Harry wants to kiss him.

“Why don’t you get showered and dressed? The girls really want you to join us for dinner.” Louis nods, taking Harry’s proffered hand to help him to his feet again.

That night, Harry dreams Louis is being nailed to a giant wooden cross in the middle of the football pitch. There’s blood running down his bare arms and legs, blood running into his eyes from the crown of thorns upon his head, but his chin is tilted up and his gaze is pointed skyward, expression oddly serene as he accepts his fate.

The stands are full of students from their school and they’re all booing and jeering, throwing rubbish and rocks at him, things that cut him, things that burst open on his skin. Harry’s frantically running around the pitch and through the stands, pleading for help, for a hammer, for something – anything - to free the nails, but no one will look at him. It’s like he’s a ghost. It’s like he’s invisible again. When Harry wakes up, his cheeks are wet with tears and his chest feels thin and hollow and it hurts to draw a breath.

He takes a puff of his inhaler and silences his alarm, sinking back into his sheets. Today’s the day the next issue of the literary magazine comes out, but Harry suddenly could care less. He’d been trying so hard to get himself right – and he still thinks, he hadn’t been wrong to do so – but in the meantime, he’d failed to notice that Louis was falling to pieces right beside him.

And maybe Harry won’t ever be Louis’ boyfriend, maybe Louis won’t ever look at him that way, but Harry thinks maybe the best thing he can be right now is the thing Louis needs the most – a friend. And Harry’s going to do his best to be one.

Chapter 8

Chapter Text

I hear you calling in the dead of night

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

Thursday morning, Harry arrives at school early and grabs a copy of the new issue of the literary magazine from outside Ms. Burnes’ office before anyone else. He wants to experience this moment alone. The last few seconds between being the old Marcel and becoming some bright new creature capable of things he’d never dared to dream.

The hallways of the school are deserted at this hour – looking like the recently abandoned epicenter of an airborne viral plague. It’s strange and unsettling seeing a place normally packed with hormonal teenagers so completely deserted. But there’s still that familiar scent lingering in the air – of sweat and textbooks and desperation – that never quite goes away no matter how hard the caretaker scrubs and today, it’s oddly comforting.

The thin sheaf of paper feels deceptively heavy in Harry’s hands as he heads for the staircase, taking the steps two a time. He’s been waiting for this moment for nearly two weeks – well, for his whole life really – and he can’t quite believe the day has finally arrived. There’s no going back now. Harry’s put something in motion that he’s helpless to stop. His words are out there in the world and it’s dual parts exciting and terrifying.

He thinks about what it will be like to see his words in print, where anyone can read them, and not just on the bright monitor of his laptop in the quiet, dark of his bedroom where they’re his alone. He knows if his piece did get in, everyone will know about it by the end of the day and the thought makes his skin prickle. He’s spent so long flying under the radar that the idea of exposing himself to a large portion of the school is completely daunting. He thinks of the Valentines he made all those years ago – the last time he really tried at anything - and wonders what he’ll do if they don’t like it. If they don’t like him. He wonders if his skin is thick enough to face that yet. Again.

Harry closes the door to the disabled toilet stall and perches as comfortably as he can – being all gangly arms and legs – on the closed toilet lid. With bated breath, he flips open to the table of contents. Slowly, he runs his finger down the rows of titles and names, but he doesn’t see his own. He checks a second time and a third, the awful realization spreading through his chest like black mold spores flourishing in a damp cellar. He feels like his lungs are shriveling, like the walls of the stall are closing in on him, like the light is growing dim. He takes a puff of his inhaler and steels himself.

Maybe it was a printing mistake. Maybe they’d forgotten him in the table of contents, but his story was still in the magazine. It was possible. Anything was possible. Ignoring his growing sense of unease, Harry goes through every single page systemically, but his piece just isn’t there. A crushing wave of disappointment rolls over him and he’s glad he skipped breakfast because he’s pretty sure if he hadn’t, he’d be revisiting it right now.

It’s not that Harry imagined he was some sort of literary genius or anything, but he read some of the pieces in the last issue and surely his was better than some of them? Better than a rhyming poem about some kid’s dog? I mean, sure it was just a first attempt, but he’s been an avid reader all his life and he knows what he likes in a good book. And he’s fairly sure the idea was original enough. And he’d spent so much time on it.

Not good enough. The words crash down him out of nowhere, catching him like fingers in a slammed door. It takes his breath away. With everything going on with Louis, he’d just – he’d wanted this – he’d wanted it so bad. He didn’t realize just how badly until now, until it was in sight and he’d lost it. He knows he shouldn’t be so hard on himself – that in the grand scheme of things – it was just a minor setback. Heck, he’d read somewhere that even JK Rowling had been rejected from twelve publishing houses before someone took a chance on Harry Potter. But Harry wasn’t JK Rowling. He wasn’t anyone. He was just a kid – just a stupid kid with an impossible dream – who’d set himself up for a fall.

Harry shuffles like a zombie off to his first lesson. The hallway is a madhouse – kids slamming lockers and people shouting things over his head – but he’s lost in a bubble of silence where nothing can penetrate. He feels like a tiny inconsequential plant on the forest floor, with giant trees growing all around him, stuck down where no sunlight can reach. Everything feels hopeless.

As he passes Louis’ locker, Louis smiles and raises a hand to wave at him, but Harry walks right by him without even realizing. His morning lessons pass by in a fog. They’re reading Catcher in the Rye in English and even though it’s one of Harry’s favorite books, he finds himself staring out the window for most of the period, watching drifts of dead leaves blow across the front lawns. In another month, there will be snow on the ground. The seasons continue to change, but for Harry it feels like everything has stopped. Or maybe it’s always been stopped – for him – maybe he’s only just realizing it now. He’s like a broken watch; the day his dad took that whip to him was the day time stopped moving forward and everything stood still. Forever.

He startles when the bell rings announcing the end of lessons and slowly goes about gathering his books. When he looks up, the entire class has emptied out and Ms. Burnes is standing over his desk, a cautious smile on her face. Normally, Harry wouldn’t mind chatting with her a few minutes before lunch about whatever book’s he’s currently reading, but he’s not looking forward to a pitying speech about sticking with it and trying again. He just wants to make it through the day so that he can go home and have a proper breakdown alone.

“Hey Harry.”

“Oh, um. Sorry I wasn’t paying attention, I just –”

She smiles softly. “I guess you noticed your piece wasn’t in the magazine then.”

Harry nods, struggling to keep the tears out of his eyes. He will not cry. He will not cry. He will not - “Do you have some time to talk?”

“Oh, uh, sure. I guess that’d be okay,” he stammers. She grins, pulling the strap of her leather bag over her shoulder.

“Great. Why don’t you grab your lunch from your locker? We can eat together in my office. You know where it is, right?”

“Oh, yeah. Okay.” Harry supposes Zayn can survive one lunch period in the art room without him. It’s not like he’s ever any help anyway. Mostly he just reads as Zayn paints, sitting side by side in companionable silence. As Harry stuffs his books back into his locker, his mind races through all the possible scenarios of why Ms. Burnes would want to talk to him. His story was meant to be imaginative, but is it possible she found it disturbing somehow? Is she going to refer him to school psychologist? Or call his mum in for a meeting? Or does she simply want to apologize and offer some kind words of encouragement? Whatever it is, Harry decides it can’t be good.

Ms. Burnes is behind her desk when he comes in, bent over an electric kettle. His eyes lock on a poster of a kitten in a hammock hanging behind her desk that says, Hang in There. “Come on in, Harry. Why don’t you shut the door behind you?”

Harry swallows hard, but does as she says, sinking into the seat across from her. He feels tired and wrung-out. He doesn’t want to talk. He just wants this all to go away. This day. This whole year, in fact. If he could just rewind to that moment right before Liam Payne ran over his cat, maybe he could stop this whole mess from happening. Stop himself from ever hoping for a normal life.

“You look like you’re going to your executioner,” she lightly teases him. “It’s not bad. I promise. Do you want some tea?”

Harry nods and she pours two cups for them, sliding a chipped mug across her desk to him that says World’s Greatest Teacher on it. Harry pours about forty sugar packets in, convinced he’s going to need them.

Ms. Burnes folds her hands on her desk and gives him an encouraging smile. “Harry, I’ve been working at this school for three years and I’ve never seen a piece like yours.”

“Is that –” He swallows hard.

“It’s a good thing,” she smiles, tucking a stray piece of blonde hair behind her ear. “You’re very talented.”

Harry blushes at her compliment. “So why..?” The question hangs in the air between them.

“Why didn’t I put in the school’s literary journal?”

Harry nods meekly, taking a tiny sip of his tea and feeling the burning threat of tears at the back of his eyes once more. “I hope you’re not angry with me. And you can say no of course. But one of my professors from Uni runs a small publishing press in Manchester. I sent him your story and he loved it as much as I did. He can’t believe a sixteen year old wrote it.”

So plagiarism? Is that it then? Harry squirms in his chair, his lunch untouched on the desk in front of him. He feels like he’s going to throw up. “Harry, he wants to publish you in the next issue of his literary journal.”

“What?” Harry feels all the color drain out of his face and Ms. Burnes looks faintly alarmed.

“I’m sorry if I did the wrong thing. They haven’t run the issue yet, so there’s still time if you want to pull it, but I think…talent like yours deserves to be recognized, Harry. And a publication like this has a much wider readership than our school’s little journal ever could. They can’t really afford to pay you much, but it could be a great stepping stone –”

“They want to – they want to publish me?” Harry stammers. It feels like he’s been taken out of an ice-water bath and plunged into hot water, everything tingling almost painfully as his body tries to catch up to the change in temperature.

“If you need time to think it over, to talk with your mum, I understand. You just have to let me know by the end of the –”

“Yes,” Harry cuts her off. “Yes. Please. I’d like that. Yes.”

“Oh Harry,” Ms. Burnes rushes out of her chair and around her desk, capturing him in a crushing hug that nearly pulls him out of his seat. “You’ve made me so happy. I was worried I’d overstepped my bounds.”

“No – you – thank you. Thank you so much.” Harry’s aware his voice is shaking and that he’s on the verge of tears, but for the first time that day, it’s for a much different reason.

When Ms. Burnes finally releases him, he feels like he’s about to burst from happiness. He feels too big for his skin, like he’s trying to crawl out of himself, like a butterfly wiggling free of its cocoon after a long period in chrysalis.

“You know Harry, even though I had the contact, you were accepted on your own merit. You should know that. This is going to be the first of big things for you. I can tell.”

“Can I – can I tell my friends? And when does it come out? And can I get a copy?” he rushes.

She laughs. “Slow down. You can tell anyone you’d like. It will come out next month and I’ll make sure to get you a bunch of copies to share with your family and friends. And if you’re interested, I’m looking for another reader to sort through our literary journal submissions. I’ve only got Perrie right now, but it’s a lot for one person and it would look good on your transcripts for Uni.”

Harry chews his bottom lip thoughtfully – he’d like to and he doesn’t want to let her down after all she’s done for him – but he’s already got babysitting and volunteering and he quite likes his free time too. “Can I think about it?”

“Of course. I know this is a lot to take in. But I’m so proud of you. You’re going to do so well for yourself.”

“Can I – can I go tell my friends?”

“Not going to eat?”

“Too excited,” Harry grins, stuffing his lunch back into his bag.

Harry just manages to catch Zayn on his way out of the art room, lugging a giant portfolio over one shoulder. “Hey, do you have a minute?” Harry asks breathlessly. “I’ve just got news.”

“Finally snogged Tommo then?” Zayn teases.

Harry blushes, but quickly recovers. “No, but I—”

“Oi, babe, can we talk about this later? I’m meeting with Perrie in like,” Zayn glances down at his watch, “two minutes. So I’ve got to run.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. I guess so.” Harry feels his shoulders deflate a bit, but Zayn doesn’t seem to notice.

He claps Harry congenially on the back. “I’ll meet you in the library during free period and you can tell me then, okay mate?”

Harry nods and tries not to look as disappointed as he feels, but free period seems so far away. He’s bursting with excitement, wants to shout it from the rooftops, but none of friends are in sight and he won’t be able to tell Gemma and his mum until later that evening. He chances ducking into the canteen and sees Niall and Louis clearing their trays into one of the rubbish bins by the exit.

“Hey guys!” he waves, jogging over to them. He’s well aware he’s grinning like a maniac but he can’t stop. He’s going to be published. He’s going to be published. He – Harry – is going to be a published writer.

“Hey, Harry,” Niall grins. “All right?”

“Yeah, fine. Listen, do you guys have a minute?”

“Sorry mate, on our way to a team meeting,” Louis says quickly, throwing an arm around Niall’s shoulder to herd him out. “Catch you later?”

Niall shoots Harry a confused, apologetic glance over his shoulder and then they’re both gone. Which – a team meeting in the middle of the day – it’s a bit odd is all. Harry can’t quite put his finger on it, but it’s almost like – it’s almost like everyone is avoiding him.

The excitement’s worn off a bit by free period, but Harry’s happy he’ll get to tell Zayn at least. Only when he gets to the library, all the lights are off and no one’s there. Which is really weird, seeing as how Alma never turns the lights off during library hours. Harry fumbles for the light switch and nearly falls over at the giant roar of chorused voices shouting, “Surprise!”.

Zayn, Perrie, Niall, Amy and Alma are all grinning at him, lined up in front of a spray-painted banner that reads Congratulations on it (no doubt done by Zayn). There are balloons too, tied to the book return cart and to the backs of the chairs. “What’s all this? It’s not my birthday?” he asks, utterly bewildered as Zayn rushes him for the first hug.

“Ms. Burnes may have let the news slip to me yesterday,” Perrie admits with a downplayed shrug, a mischievous twinkle in her big blue eyes. Harry drags Perrie into his hug with Zayn, getting a mouthful of pink hair for his efforts.

Alma is the next to hug him, murmuring, “I always knew you had it in you,” before he’s passed on to the next person.

After hugs and congratulations, they all sit down at a round table near the back wall, crowded with bottles of soda and bowls of assorted crisps. Harry didn’t eat breakfast or lunch and his appetite returns in full force as he loads his plate with snacks. Louis is suspiciously absent from the gathering, but everyone is laughing and smiling and having a good time so Harry tries not to be too down about it. Louis does have a lot going on at the moment; Harry can’t expect him to drop things at a moment’s notice.

Zayn hooks Harry’s Ipod up to some speakers he brought for the occasion and soon there’s quiet music playing in the background and Niall is telling a story about a prank he’d played on the footie team that would have ended in bodily harm had it been anyone but Niall pulling it. (He’s so loveable it’s hard to be properly mad at him.) When they’re all catching their breath from laughing so hard, there’s a brief lull in the conversation.

“There was um, there was meant to be a cake too,” Perrie says apologetically.

And just then, as if on cue, Louis bursts through the library’s double doors, balancing a cake box in one hand and flattening his wild fringe back into place with the other. Louis is sweaty and looks a bit unhinged, but Harry has never been more glad to see anyone in his life.

“Sorry. Sorry.”

“You got that this was a surprise party right?” Niall smirks, but there’s something like relief in his eyes. Harry wonders if he’d doubted Louis would show up.

“Sorry, there was a line,” Louis blushes, setting the box down on the table. “Tada!” He leans down to give Harry a quick hug, straightening his shirt as they pull apart. “Erm, surprise?” Everyone laughs.

“Let’s see this cake then,” Niall says, rubbing his hands together.

“Oi, it’s not your party,” Amy protests, elbowing him. “Harry should cut it.”

Harry opens the box and sets the cake on a plate, taking the knife Alma hands him. “Should we sing or something?” Perrie asks to the collective groans of everyone.

“Louis, did you even pick up the right cake?” Niall squints, elbowing Harry to get a better look at what’s written on it. It says Congrats BB on it in pink icing and now that Harry thinks of it, it is a bit odd.

“BB is obviously short for baby,” Perrie supplies helpfully. “Right?” Amy coughs awkwardly, trying to conceal it into her sleeve.

Harry’s face heats up, but it burns even more when Louis grips his shoulders from behind and leans down so their cheeks are pressed together. He whispers, right next to Harry’s ear, so only he can hear, “Boner boy.”

The knife jerks in Harry’s hand, smearing the writing and nearly taking off one of his fingers in the process. Niall rolls his eyes and grabs the knife from Harry. “Oi, give me that.” Harry gratefully sinks back into his seat as Niall cuts slices and Alma hands plates out to everyone.

There’s no spare seat for Louis at the table so he flops into Harry’s lap to eat. “Try not to get too excited,” he deadpans over his shoulder and Harry nearly chokes on the piece of cake he’s in the process of swallowing.

“Lou, will you stop torturing Harry?” Zayn asks, exasperated.

“I’ll stop torturing him when he stops enjoying it,” Louis says smugly and Harry might just smash a bit of cake into Louis’ hair for that. Louis retaliates by smushing his leftover cake into Harry’s face and Alma has to break it up before it becomes an all out food war.

Harry excuses himself to the boy’s loo to clean up and he’s standing at the sink when Louis appears in the mirror over his shoulder. His crotch bumps into Harry’s arse, pressing Harry forward into the sink. “You missed a bit,” Louis grins wickedly and then proceeds to lick a line up Harry’s neck. Harry gasps, hips stuttering forward against the sink. He can feel the thick, hard line of Louis’ erection pressed up against him from behind and he’s shaking with how badly he wants it. How badly he wants Louis to just bend him over and f*ck him right there. sh*t. Where did that come from?

“Lou - ” Harry says breathlessly, meeting Louis’ reflection in the mirror. Louis’ eyes are dark with lust, mouth gone slack as he grips Harry’s hips, grinding up against him. Harry’s nipples are hard, pushing points into his shirt. He trembles as Louis slides his fingers under the hem of his shirt and through the light dusting of hair above his waistband. “Lou, stop. We can’t.”

Louis freezes and pulls his hand back abruptly. The mask slips back into place on his face, his features gone disturbingly blank. “Sorry, sorry, you’re right.”

Louis walks over to the paper towel dispenser and cranks off several sheets, tearing them off with a bit too much aggression. He wads them up and runs them under the tap, daubing at the icing in his fringe. “You just…you look really nice today,” he says softly.

Harry stares at Louis, slack-jawed. He doesn’t get why Louis teases him like this, knowing how Harry feels for him and knowing very well that Harry can’t have him. It’s not fair. None of it’s fair. Today should be about celebrating his accomplishments, not about reminding him of what he can’t have. “You know I like you Louis, but sometimes you can be a real twat,” Harry says, softly but firmly.

“sh*t, Harry, I’m sorry,” Louis says, head hanging. “It’s just…sometimes, I find it hard to control myself around you. But you’re right. I’ll just – I’ll try harder.”

Harry stares at him. Louis finds it hard to control himself around Harry? Last Harry checked - he was Boner Boy - not Louis. He was the one who couldn’t control his body’s reactions to Louis, something Louis went to humiliating lengths to remind him of.

“Thanks for the cake,” Harry says shortly, throwing his paper towels away and heading for the door before he’ll say something he regrets.

“Wait, Harry – you’ll get me a copy when it comes out?”

“Sure.”

“Great. I’m sure my mum would love to put it on the fridge.” His mum. Right. Not him. Because why would Louis be proud of Harry, why would Louis care? Why would Louis give a sh*t about anyone but himself and his reputation?

Harry knows he’s being uncharitable – that it’s hard to come out as gay and even harder to have a knocked-up girlfriend at sixteen – but Louis chose those things. He could have stood by Zayn and admitted his feelings for him. He could have not slept with Eleanor. He could have stood up to Stan ages ago. He could have kissed Harry and meant it.

Harry’s taking responsibility for his life and his actions; why can’t Louis do the same? Why can’t Louis just grow up?

“See you back in there?” Louis says softly, hopefully and Harry’s resolve melts all over again.

He smiles, despite himself, and lets his eyes drift down to Louis’ crotch, to the obvious line of his erection making itself known in his trousers.

“Might want to take care of that first,” Harry says with a smirk. Louis blushes wildly as Harry winks at him. He feels a bit of grim satisfaction at the look of frustration on Louis’ face as his hands shoot down to adjust himself. It’s only slightly undermined by the stirrings of an erection in his own pants. f*ck. Why does Louis have to be so fit? So fit and so hopelessly unavailable?

Harry’s mum takes he and Gemma and Ed out for a celebratory dinner after his reading circle at the library on Tuesday night. Everyone’s laughing and in good spirits and his mum drinks a little too much wine and Ed has to drive home. Ed regales them all with stories about little old ladies who come into the bakery and want something you can eat without teeth and Gemma’s going on about some pram she saw online that she wants for the baby and even when the attention’s not on him, Harry’s just happy to just be a part of it. To be a family again. Sometimes, it seems like they’re all off in different directions, like he’s always alone in everything he does, but Harry realizes that’s not the case at all. For a while, he sort of preferred to be alone, because it was easier to hide that way, but he forgot how nice it is to spend time with people who love you no matter what. Whether he’s Marcel or Harry, whether he’s got glasses or not, whether he’s a published writer or just some quiet bloke who sits up in his room reading books.

Every once in a while, when Harry glances up from his food or when they reach a lull in the conversation, Harry catches his mum looking at him with this quiet, fierce pride in her eyes that makes him dizzy with happiness. She’s always been proud of him no matter what, but when she looked at him before, it was always mixed with concern, but tonight there’s none of the usual worry there and it gives him hope. Like he might actually turn out okay. Like he might actually be all right.

When they get home around nine, Harry starts his next short story. It’s a melancholy story about a vampire who’s made bad choices and the boy who loves him called, What’s Dead Should Stay Dead, and it includes Harry’s first gay characters. He’s not sure if he’ll actually submit it anywhere – he’s not even officially come out to his mum yet, though from his conversation with Gemma, he’s sure she has a good idea – but it feels good to write. To put things on paper. It feels like his life has a purpose and a direction and he’s not just watching sand slide through an hourglass.

Wednesday’s baby-sitting as usual and Harry buys a couple of Lego sets on his way over to the Tomlinson’s to put together with the girls. Lottie has a new boyfriend and spends most of the night texting him, but the twins are thrilled. They get through their homework in record time and are well on their way to building a Lego castle by dinner. Harry’s making fish and chips (and peas of course because the girls have got to have a vegetable) and the whole house smells delightfully of fried food.

Louis doesn’t go to practice that night even though his knee has healed, but he doesn’t come down from his room either. It makes Harry anxious that he’s upset about what happened on Monday, but he still doesn’t think he was wrong in stopping Louis. Whatever it is between them, Louis is with Eleanor and they’re going to have a baby together. And Harry’s not stupid enough or cruel enough to stand between them.

When he’s finished cooking, Harry goes up to Louis’ room to call him down for dinner. Harry’s always been anxious about entering Louis’ room – since interrupting him that time with Eleanor when Fizzy was sick and since he’s accidentally overheard quite a few of Louis’ arguments with her – it’s always felt off limits too him. But the door is open and Louis is just sitting at his desk with the lights off, staring out the window. Even though he’s not doing anything, Harry feels oddly like he’s intruding on a private moment.

“Lou – is everything – are you okay?” Harry asks timidly. When he doesn’t respond, Harry takes a few steps toward him, his hand coming to rest on Louis’ shoulder.

Louis jumps, whirling around to look at Harry, like a cornered animal. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. Dinner’s ready if you want to join us.”

“Oh, right,” Louis nods, but he looks lost, like he’s on a completely different planet.

“Lou, is this about Monday? Because it’s not that I –”

“It’s Fizzy. They uh – they admitted her to Intensive care this morning. The girls don’t know so please don’t say anything.”

“Oh, Louis. I’m so sorry,” Harry says. He bends down to draw Louis into a hug and Louis sags in his arms like a rag doll, like all the energy’s been sucked out of his body.

“I don’t know what I’ll do if she dies. I don’t know if I’ll…recover,” Louis whispers, his voice rough. He doesn’t sound like he’s going to cry, he sounds like he’s making himself numb to it all, like he’s distancing himself and that scares Harry more than if he’d just been crying. “I haven’t even told my parents about the baby yet. It just – it seems like a bad time to bring a person into the world. Just as they’re losing their baby.”

“Louis, you don’t know that – It could still be –” But Harry doesn’t know what to say. It could still be okay? But it’s very clearly not. He feels guilty because his own life is finally coming together and Louis’ is falling to pieces beside him and he doesn’t know how to help or what to do or what to say. Is this how his mother felt when he and Gemma were being abused by their dad? Like she’d rip her own heart out if she thought it would help? And maybe she did in a way, when she chose to leave their dad, when she chose Harry and Gemma over him. Because that’s what loving someone was about, wasn’t it? Putting their own happiness ahead of yours? Harry would switch places with Louis in a heartbeat if it meant he could take a little of the weight off his shoulders.

Louis’ body stiffens suddenly in Harry’s arms and he pulls out of the hug, dragging a hand over his face. His expression is empty, eyes like two lanterns with the flames snuffed out. He looks like a shell of the old Louis. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t put this on you.”

“Louis, I – I want you to. To come to me if you need someone to talk to. That’s what mates are for, yeah?”

“Mates?” Louis scoffs bitterly, looking back toward the window. There’s a full moon outside and Louis’ profile is limed in silver, his eyelashes fluttering rapidly like a moth’s wings, casting dancing, circular shadows on his cheeks. He looks too thin, his jaw and cheeks angular and pronounced. Harry wants to kiss every bone in his face. Harry wants to kiss him until everything else goes away but his mouth and Louis’ skin. “Is that what you think this is?”

Harry’s voice trembles when he speaks at last. “I don’t know. What is this, Louis? You tell me.”

Louis shakes his head, like someone waking from a dream, trying to dispel the last silvery threads of cobweb from his mind. “It doesn’t matter anyway. I’ll be down for dinner in a few, okay?”

Harry nods and it takes everything in him to make his body move out the door again, to keep himself from kissing every bit of Louis he can get to. He makes it all the way to the stairwell before he starts to cry.

Louis is out of school on Thursday and Friday and the whole family’s at the hospital on Saturday so Harry doesn’t have to babysit, but Louis shows up at Harry’s house on Sunday to help get the nursery ready. Most of Ed’s friends are off to Uni and Gemma’s only got a month until the baby arrives, so Ed had Harry bribe his friends with pizza and soda to come paint and put furniture together. Zayn, Liam, Perrie, Amy and Niall are already upstairs when Louis arrives, looking like he hasn’t slept in days. Before he’s even stepped over the threshold into the house, Harry immediately pulls him into a bone-crushing hug.

“Is this how you great all your guests?” Louis teases, but the lame attempt at humor is lost as he burrows his nose into Harry’s shoulder, lips ice-cold against Harry’s neck.

“I didn’t think you would come,” Harry admits, when they reluctantly release each other. “With everything going on…are you sure…?”

“Styles, I say this with love, but you are the most infuriating person I’ve ever met,” Louis says, smirking, as he kicks off his boots. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to be, okay? Plus, mum kicked me out of the hospital room. Said I was starting to stink.”

Harry sniffs the air around him. “You are. A bit.”

“Oh, shut up, you tosser,” Louis smacks him.

Harry grabs Louis’ elbow and steers him into the kitchen. “Come on, I’ll make you some tea and then you’re having a nap in my room.”

“I want to help –” Louis protests weakly.

“You can help me by sleeping.”

“Styles, if this is your transparent attempt at getting me in your bed, I’ll have you know—”

“Don’t push it, Louis,” Harry says firmly, as he sets water on the stove to boil. When the tea’s done, Harry gives Louis a pair of his sweats to sleep in and when he checks in on him a minute later, he has to stifle his laughter into his sleeve. His clothes are practically falling off Louis – the neck of the jumper is nearly off one shoulder, showing the slope of his collarbone and delicate white throat – and the sweats are puddling around his ankles.

“Have you got anything in normal person size?” Louis grumbles, hitching up the sweats. “All these clothes were made for a Yeti.”

“Just shut up and sleep, okay? I’ll wake you when the pizza’s here.”

“You’re so bossy today. I like it,” Louis laughs, but dutifully crawls under Harry’s covers. Louis reaches out and grabs Harry’s hand unexpectedly and kisses his knuckles, looking up at Harry from under the fringe of his long lashes, “thanks.”

It takes Harry a second to find his voice and when it comes out, it’s high and off-pitch. “No problem.”

Back in the nursery, it’s a flurry of activity. There are drop-clothes strewn over the floor and Niall is up on a ladder painting the walls a pale, sunny yellow. Liam and Ed are trying to figure out how to assemble a crib, while Perrie and Amy are working on the changing table. Zayn’s got his art supplies set up in one corner and he’s painting a mural of two giraffes that’s disgustingly adorable. Everyone turns to look at Harry when he enters. “Is Louis here?” Liam asks, setting down the sheet of directions he’d been trying to interpret a moment ago.

“He’s just resting a bit. He’ll join us in a little.”

Niall grumbles. “Leave it to Louis to get out of work. You know, when we went to Leeds, he made me and Liam put the tent together while he went to beg beers off someone.”

“Leave him be,” Liam says softly, handing a table leg to Ed.

“Well, I’m gonna take a smoke break,” Zayn says decisively, setting aside his paints. “Anyone want to join?”

“I’ll come,” Liam quickly says.

“You don’t even smoke?” Niall questions, one eyebrow raised. “Something about one lung or kidney or something?”

“Shut up, Niall,” Liam snaps defensively. “I just want some fresh air is all.”

Twenty minutes later, Liam and Zayn stumble back in, their cheeks flushed from the cold. “How long does it take to get fresh air?” Niall teases.

“Well, if someone wasn’t farting every five minutes, maybe they wouldn’t need fresh air—” Perrie interjects.

Niall folds his arms across his chest, clearly affronted. “It wasn’t me. I always admit it.”

“Sure,” Perrie giggles, ducking a stuffed penguin Niall tosses at her. For a while, it descends into name-calling, but then Ed reminds them that they’re on a tight schedule – Harry’s mum has taken Gemma out for shopping and dinner – and it’s meant to be a surprise when she gets back.

By five o’clock, the room is looking like an actual nursery. The walls are all painted and they’ve got a border up with tiny yellow elephants, clasped onto one another trunk to tail. The drop clothes are away and all the furniture is built and in place and Zayn’s mural – which Ed insists on paying him for - is drying.

The pizza arrives around six and by then, they’re all splayed out on the carpet, muscles sore and too tired to do anything but eat.

“sh*t, can you believe there’s going to be a baby in here in another month?” Niall asks in awe, gazing around as he shoves his fourth slice of pizza into his mouth.

“That’s the general idea,” Ed laughs, shrugging.

“No, but I mean, you’re going to be a dad. You’re going to be responsible for like a little person. Like, for ever.” Harry swallows hard. He’s thinking of Louis and Eleanor and yeah, forever is a pretty long time.

“Thanks, like I’m not already nervous enough,” Ed says, wiping his palms on his jeans.

“You’ll be great,” Liam says, clapping Ed on the back.

“Who’ll be great?” a small voice asks from the doorway and when Harry looks up, Louis is standing in the doorway to the nursery, toweling off his wet hair. He looks a lot better than when he showed up on Harry’s doorstep. There’s some color in his cheeks again and the darkness under his eyes isn’t as pronounced as it once was.

“Oh, look who deigned to join us,” Niall says dramatically, waving an arm in the air. “Prince Louis. Just in time for pizza.”

“Shut up, Niall,” Liam says, sending the blond a stern look before he turns back to Louis, face crinkled with concern. Hmm…so maybe Liam knows about Louis’ sister and Niall doesn’t? Well, Liam is Louis’ best mate other than Stan, so it makes sense. Still, it’s odd that Harry knew before Niall.

“Come join us,” Harry says, patting the patch of carpet beside him. They’ve all mostly eaten, though Niall is still working on Amy’s crusts (it’s the best part). Perrie’s head is pillowed on Zayn’s lap and Zayn has an ankle hooked around Liam’s and Niall has his head on Amy’s stomach, where she’s running her fingers through his hair. It’s funny, how ridiculously easy and intimate they all are with each other, and how overwhelmingly wonderful it is for someone like Harry, who’s spent most of his life without friends.

Harry’s only too aware of how seeing the nursery in its finished state must affect Louis, knowing he has a baby of his own on the way, but Louis plops down next to Harry without a word and grabs a paper plate. He eats two slices of pizza before collapsing with his head in Harry’s lap, yawning into the balled-up sleeve of Harry’s borrowed jumper, which comes down over his hands like sweater paws. Harry idly runs his fingers through Louis’ drying hair, which smells like the apple shampoo he has in his shower. Zayn’s eyes settle curiously on Harry’s hand, where its tangled in Louis’ hair, and Harry freezes until Zayn gives him a small, encouraging nod.

“So, do you know if it’s a boy or girl?” Perrie asks Ed.

“We wanted it to be a surprise.”

Zayn grumbles when Perrie shifts her legs to get more comfortable. “All right love?”

“I’ve got a headache. Must be the paint fumes,” Zayn says, draping a hand over his eyes to shield them from the light.

“Oh, I think I’ve got Paracetamol in my bag,” Amy says, shifting Niall off of her to root through her purse. Niall grunts, but takes the opportunity to grab another slice of pizza.

Amy finally finds the bottle, but when she shakes it, it’s empty. “Must have given the last one to Eleanor on Friday,” she shrugs apologetically. “Maybe Harry has—”

“What did you say?” Louis’ head springs up from Harry’s lap.

Amy stares at Louis, letting out a nervous laugh. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, about giving Eleanor a Paracetamol. She shouldn’t be taking any drugs. Not in her condition.”

“Er, it’s not drugs? And it's hardly a condition. She had cramps and I lent her a tampon and some Paracetamol. It’s not a big deal really. It happens to all girls. I’m sure she’ll survive.”

“Wait, you – you’re saying she’s on her period?” Louis’ eyes are scarily intense and the air in the room is suddenly thick with tension.

“I mean, I didn’t check or anything, but she got a note from the nurse to get out of gym so…I don’t get what the big deal is.”

“I’ve got to go,” Louis says, standing abruptly.

“Lou, wait—” Harry calls, but Louis is already out the door.

Everyone turns to stare at Harry in Louis’ absence. “What was that all about?” Amy asks.

“Uh, I can’t – I’m not sure it’s my place to—” Harry stammers, face flushing. He’s still trying to absorb the news that Eleanor might actually not be pregnant, but he’s pretty sure Louis told him in confidence. I mean, Louis hasn’t even told his parents yet; Harry’s not about to blab it to all his friends.

“Eleanor told Louis she was pregnant,” Liam says, answering for Harry.

“What?” Perrie asks at the same time that Niall says, “Holy sh*t,” and drops a Pepperoni into Amy’s hair.

Perrie sits up abruptly, dropping Zayn’s head onto the floor and he groans, clutching it. “Zayn, why don’t we um, see about that Paracetamol?” Harry asks nervously.

“Wait, she lied to him?” Niall asks.

Liam shrugs. “Seems like it.”

“Guys, I think – it’s Louis’ business…I don’t think it’s our place,” Harry stammers, twisting his hands uncomfortably in his lap. “It isn’t right to talk about him when he’s not here.”

“Harry’s right,” Ed backs him up and Harry sends him a grateful glance. “Maybe we should just call it a day?”

There’s a few groans, but everyone reluctantly starts to gather their stuff. Harry goes through the motions of saying goodbye to everyone and throwing away the rubbish everyone’s left behind, but he’s in shock.

He startles when Ed clamps a hand down over his shoulder at the sink, where he’s standing in the kitchen staring out at the side garden. She lied to him. She lied to him. She lied to him. Harry’s not sure what to feel. On the one hand he’s so furious he’s seeing white – that Eleanor would put Louis through all that – when he already had so much going on with his sister is just the worst thing he can think of. But on the other hand, he feels just – relieved. And happy. He’s under no illusion that if Louis breaks up with her, he’ll suddenly want to date him, but Harry just wants Louis to be happy and it’s clear he wasn’t with Eleanor.

“You okay?”

“I think – ” Harry pauses, trying to gather together words that express how he feels. “I think I need a drink.”

Ed laughs. “I know just the thing. You know – in addition to playing guitar and building cribs – I can make a pretty mean Margarita.”

Harry smiles and lets out the breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

Chapter 9

Chapter Text

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

The thing is - just because Harry’s on a newfound crusade for change doesn’t mean that he doesn’t occasionally slip back into old routines. Sometimes, when his skin feels tight, when the halls are overcrowded with unfamiliar faces, he just wants something comfortable and familiar and easy. Sometimes, he just wants his disabled toilet stall, with its decrepit plumbing and rude graffiti and lingering smell of damp.

And he doesn’t think of it as slipping backwards so much as it is revisiting a place where he’s experienced sporadic moments of intense happiness and sadness. He used to think of the past as an aggregate of missed opportunities, a constellation of times he hadn’t taken a risk or gone outside his comfort zone, but now he realizes those times weren’t for nothing. They were his becoming. His past shaped him. For Harry, change wasn’t about becoming someone he wasn’t; it was about becoming the person he ought to have been – the person he might have already been had he not been derailed as a child.

Besides, it’s not like there’s a lot to do. It’s a rainy Tuesday in late October - the perfect sort of weather to stay inside and cozy up with a book. Louis is absent and Zayn is helping the drama department with set design during lunch and entering the noisy, overheated canteen is just about as appealing as entering a gladiator ring full of starved lions. Harry just wants to eat his sandwich and read another chapter of Everything is Illuminated in peace.

Only, the day he chooses to hide out is the day someone else has the same idea. Upon entering the toilets, Harry can hear the sound of someone crying behind the closed door of his usual stall and it gives him pause. His immediate instinct is to run because he doesn’t like dealing with this sort of thing - wading through other people’s emotional baggage is a bit like trying to navigate a ship through narrow straits choked with ice-burgs of indeterminable depth. He never knows just what will sink him.

But the thing about changing is that it’s about facing your fears head-on and not just hiding from things you’d rather not deal with. And when Harry glances down at his book, there’s a post-it note from Alma stuck to the cover that says: “You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness” and it seems sort of apt in the moment.

Harry takes a deep, fortifying breath and knocks. The person on the other side sucks back a syrupy sniffle. “Go away,” a girl answers in a wrecked, trembling voice.

Harry puts his hand tentatively on the cool metal door. “Uh, you do know this is the boy’s loo, right?”

“Harry?” the girl sputters and Harry startles back from the door because he’d know that voice anywhere. But what’s Eleanor doing in the boy’s loo? Harry doesn’t know what happened after Louis left his house on Sunday – Fizzy took a turn for the worse and Louis has been at the hospital with his family – he sent Harry one or two texts about his sister, but didn’t mention what happened with Eleanor. Not that it’s any of his business.

“Are you okay?” he asks tentatively.

“Just leave me alone. Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”

“I haven’t done anything,” Harry firmly insists, slinging his backpack up onto the window ledge and hauling himself up after it. The window glass is cold against his back through his thin jumper. The radiator lets out a gargled hiss, steam fogging his glasses. Harry takes them off and rubs at the lenses with his sleeve. (He would have worn contacts but he’d been up all night working on his short story and hadn’t had time to put them in the morning.)

“You took him from me,” Eleanor whimpers. And sh*t, Harry nearly feels sorry for her. Well, nearly.

“Took him? El, he’s not a thing, okay? He’s not a sports coupe or a handbag or an accessory. He’s a person. He can make his own decisions.”

“I know that,” she snaps, choking back another sob.

“Do you? Because if I loved someone, I wouldn’t tell them a lie to keep them with me. If I loved someone, I would let them go if it meant they would be happier without me.”

Harry coughs into his sleeve, throat suddenly dry. He doesn’t mention the fact that he does lovesomeone, the same someone Eleanor is crying over. Because he’s pretty sure she already knows – he’s pretty sure everyone knows – everyone who’s been paying attention anyway. Harry’s tried to hide it – but it’s on his face as plainly as the graffiti on the loo walls – loving Louis is a part of him now.

“You don’t get it,” Eleanor cries. “Without Louis, I’m - I’m nothing. I’m back to being nobody.” She’s silent for a moment and Harry idly picks at the sleeve of his jumper in the interim. Since updating his wardrobe, he sometimes misses all the layers, sometimes doesn’t know what to do with his hands. Before he felt contained and now he feels sort of loose, like change rattling around in a car cup-holder. There’s no armor to hold him together anymore.

When Eleanor speaks, her voice is nearly inaudible over the hiss of the radiator and the whoosh of water through the pipes. “It’s just - I don’t know who I am without him.”

Harry sighs as he looks at his neglected lunch. He really doesn’t feel like hashing this out with Eleanor right now or ever, but she’s here and he’s here and he’s trying to display the same compassion he’d want if he were in the opposite situation.

“Well, maybe it’s time to find out. I mean - I’m not judging you - but it’s sort of unhealthy to build your life around someone. You should look at the breakup as an opportunity to do some soul-searching. And like - you’re really pretty and smart - I’m sure lots of guys would want to date you once you’ve figured yourself out. And no offense, but there were times it didn’t seem like you even liked Louis - at like a basic human level...You were always picking on him and wanting him to be someone he wasn’t...And maybe it’s just better for both of you this way…”

“Better for you, you mean?” she snaps. But her tone lacks the usual conviction and, if anything, she sounds a little resigned.

Harry scrubs at his face, runs a hand back over his curls. “I didn’t ask for this, okay? I didn’t ask for you to lie to him. And I didn’t ask for him to break up with you. And I didn’t ask for Liam bloody Payne to run over my cat…”

“What?”

“’S Nothing,” Harry sighs.

“You don’t understand,” Eleanor says miserably, choking back another sob. “You don’t know what’s it like…”

Harry crouches down, passing Eleanor a handful of tissues under the stall door. “So tell me.”

Eleanor sniffles and blows her nose wetly into the tissue he gave her. “Okay. How’s this? I’ve had an eating disorder since I was nine years old. The only time my parents ever praise me is when I’m thin. Like – like – that’s the only thing I’m good at. Making myself smaller. They travel six months out of the year and they leave me at home by myself. They have since I was twelve. I have a closer relationship with our housekeeper than my own mum. Before I met Louis, I used to try to get their attention by partying all the time and instead of trying to get me the help I so desperately needed, they tried to disinherit me. My relationship with Louis and how much food I don’t eat are the only things I’ve felt I had control over for the last two years.”

“El,” Harry says softly.

“I just – I got scared, okay? I saw the way he looked at you – that night at the football game – and I got scared. I lied because I thought I was losing him, and because if I don’t have Louis, I’m just another sad, little rich girl with an eating disorder and daddy and mummy issues. And not only am I that slag again, I’m that slag who couldn’t keep anyone around long enough to love me.”

Harry sighs. “That’s not true,” he says, the words being wrenched out of him. Harry wants to hate Eleanor – and he has every right to – but it’s a waste of energy and emotion, especially when she seems to be doing such a good job of hating herself.

“You’re not a slag and you’re not unlovable and you’re not a cliché, unless you make yourself one. Listen, I get it. I know what it’s like to feel out of control – to feel like everything happens to you and not because you chose it. Your parents and your teachers make decisions for you and they’re not always in your best interest, but all you can do is shut up and take it. And you just so desperately want to feel like what you think and say and do matters. Like you matter.”

Harry sits down outside the stall door, his back to the cold tile wall. He tries not to think about the urine content of the loo floors and concentrate on the task at hand. “It’s like – I used to have these routines, right? And I thought – if I could just stick to them and if everything went according to plan – I’d be okay. If I just kept my head down, I could get through it.”

“And did that work?” Eleanor softly inquires.

“For a while, yeah. But sooner or later things happen that are beyond your control. People enter your life when you don’t want them to or when you least expect them to. And at first, you don’t want to love or care about them – because it goes against all your instincts for self-preservation, all your mechanisms for self-defense – but one day, you wake up and you love them anyway, despite yourself. And I guess, after a while, I stopped wanting to just get through it and started wanting to be present in my own life.”

Harry holds his hand under the stall door and it’s only a matter of seconds before Eleanor reaches out and takes his hand in hers. Her hand is so small, it’s swallowed in his, and Harry can’t help but think it funny that he’d been scared of her once. He’d been so cowed and humiliated by her sharp remarks that he’d never actually realized how physically unintimidating she is.

Eleanor’s just a little girl, just a frail, messed-up little girl with barely any skin on her bones to keep her warm. And like him, she’s built a shell to keep people out – but while his was like a tortoise shell to stay safe and hidden away – her covering was made of spikes like a cactus to prevent anyone from ever getting close enough to realize she was hollow inside.

“Can I ask you something?” she asks, in a small watery voice.

“Course.”

“Why are you being so nice to me? I was horrible to you.”

Harry thinks of the Valentine from Louis, tucked away in the shoebox under his bed, and he has his answer. “Because a long time ago, someone was nice to me too.”

Harry’s afternoon lessons drag slowly by and he spends most of the time watching raindrops skitter across the window glass in horizontal patterns and idly doodling Louis’ name in the margin of his notebook. He wants to text Louis, but he doesn’t want to interrupt what’s obviously a family moment, or to seem over-eager after Louis’ breakup with Eleanor. Best to wait. To give Louis some space.

Alma’s working on her doctoral dissertation when Harry ambles into the library during free period, her face partially obscured behind a towering stack of textbooks. She gives him a beleaguered smile and a distracted, three-fingered wave that he returns before slinking off to the stacks near the back of the library. The sky outside is gray with amassed storm clouds and hardly any light filters through the tall windows, much less onto the dim patches of rug between the shelves. The only illumination comes from the fluorescent ceiling panels overhead, but many of the bulbs have gone out and the light they emit is a sickly, flickering white that makes Harry’s skin look even paler than it already is.

It’s a gloomy day by all accounts – and a strange one too – after Harry coaxed Eleanor out of the disabled toilet stall in the boy’s loo, she’d actually hugged him, which was – well – unexpected, to say the least. He’s still angry at her on Louis’ behalf – what she did was inexcusable, especially considering everything going on with Fizzy – but Harry’s done holding grudges that only bring him down. He feels lighter in the wake of their conversation and it’s left him looking at the world through different eyes. He’s spent so much time worrying that no one sees the real him that he’s not sure he’s taken the time to give others the same consideration.

Sighing, Harry plops himself down in the Biographies section, stretching his long legs out in front of him. The skinny jeans he bought with Zayn just a few weeks ago are already too short and he wonders if he’ll ever stop growing, or if he’s destined to be a tall, clumsy giraffe of a boy. It’s times like these he envies Louis’ small, compact physique; it’s hard to escape other people’s notice when he’s constantly tripping over his own feet and knocking his head on low doorways. And even though Harry’s trying to come out of his shell these days, the instinct to hide away is still very much there.

Harry’s stomach grumbles loudly, reminding him that he hasn’t eaten since breakfast. He un-wraps his now soggy sandwich and flips open to latest page in his book. He’s just lifting his sandwich up to his mouth to take a bite when a breathy moan breaks the silence. A glop of chicken salad escapes the bread and falls onto Harry’s jeans, but he doesn’t make any motion to wipe it away. Harry’s frozen in place, ears straining to catch another stray sound, when a pile of books across from him suddenly topples off the shelf. Harry makes a startled noise, but manages to clamp a hand over his mouth in time, so no sound escapes.

“f*ck, don’t stop,” a wrecked voice groans and Harry feels his face flush from his neck to the tips of his ears. Whoever it is, they’re really going at it.

Harry’s happened upon a few adventurous snoggers in his time – the library’s one of the few deserted places on campus – and unlike under the bleachers down by the pitch – there’s actual a dry spot of ground to lie on. Most of the time, this is Harry’s cue to find somewhere else to spend free period, but today, in the aftermath of his unexpected heart-to-heart with Eleanor, he’s strangely curious. And okay, he’s a teenage boy, so he can’t really be blamed for having a boner, especially given the very lewd, wet sex noises currently coming from the Non-Fiction stacks.

Lunch completely forgotten for the second time that day, Harry stands up and peers through the rectangular square of space left behind by the displaced books. He can’t see much – the back of someone’s shirt is cloaking the scene from his view – but judging by how broad the shoulders are and the masculine nature of the moans, Harry’d strongly wager it’s a bloke.

Being careful to not make any sound that would alert someone to his presence, Harry quietly creeps around the end of the stacks. He nearly remains undetected. Nearly.

But it’s just so unexpected. And while his dick inevitably gives a twitch at the sight, his mind’s still struggling to wrap around the scene in front of him. Zayn’s on his knees – face flushed and eyes watering – mouth wrapped around Liam Payne’s co*ck, one hand circling the base and the other laid flat over Liam’s clenched abs as he presses him back into the stacks. Liam’s head is rolled back toward the ceiling and his eyes are squeezed closed, his face glistening with a thin sheen of sweat.

“f*ck, Zayn. I’m cumming,” Liam warns, biting down on his bottom lip as his body tenses. And that’s when Harry loses his balance and trips over a stray cart of books, scattering them everywhere and going ass-over-teakettle onto the floor.

Zayn pulls back, startled, and as a result, most of Liam’s cum hits him in the face. It’s running down his cheek and sticking his long eyelashes together and Harry’s hand twitches at his side, longing to give his erection a squeeze. Boner boy, he hears Louis taunting in his head, and he bites down on his lip to keep from making an embarrassing sound.

Zayn is Harry’s friend, but it hasn’t escaped his notice that the other boy’s attractive and Harry is a hormonal sixteen-year-old virgin with an overactive imagination. And Liam’s not so bad either and Harry’s never seen a dick so big – well never seen any dick really, outside of p*rn – and it’s so there and red and in his face, well in Zayn’s face, really, but Harry’s not sure that’s much better. The whole thing is making Harry kind of lightheaded and he’s glad he’s already on the floor because he’s not sure his legs would support him if he was standing. I mean, just because he loves Louis, doesn’t mean he’s immune.

It takes Liam a few seconds to realize what’s happening – why Zayn pulled back at the last second – but as he comes down from his org*sm, he sees Harry sitting amongst the ruins of the spilled book cart and spits out a curse, fumbling to zip his flies around his half-hard co*ck. Harry’s aware that his mouth is moving, but no actual sound is coming out, though he’s not sure what he’d say even if he could speak. Nice dick, maybe?

Zayn’s trying to blink the cum out one eye, whilst attempting to lick the rest from his face. His lips are obscenely red and swollen as they suck his fingers into his mouth. Harry’s finding it hard to look at him he’s so beautiful and debauched and lovely, so he looks at the floor instead, wishing in vain that the carpet pattern will open up and swallow him.

“sh*t – Harry – sh*t—f*ck-” Zayn curses shakily, his voice blown. Harry pulls a tissue out of his pocket and offers it to Zayn, who gratefully takes it from him, scrubbingat hischeek.

“Sorry – I was just – I was having lunch and I heard – sorry. Sorry,” Harry stammers. “I’ll just – I’ll go?”

“Wait,” Zayn clasps Harry’s wrist in his hand and Harry tries not to think about the fact that it was holding Liam Payne’s co*ck only a few moments ago. Zayn’s face is mostly clean now so Harry chances a glance at him, trying to keep his labored breathing under control. Zayn’s eyes are golden and bewitching, framed by heavy lashes and for a fleeting second Harry feels like kissing him. sh*t. Where did that come from?

“Did you get to eat lunch?” Zayn asks softly.

“Uh, no – I – it’s been kind of a weird day,” Harry admits with a sigh.

Liam lets out a startled laugh from where he’s mostly recovered himself and Zayn shares a silent look with him before giving Harry a soft smile. “I think we can all agree on that point. Come on; let me take you to lunch, okay?”

“Yeah, let me just – put these books back—” he scrabbles, trying to gather the fallen books just as Alma ducks her head around the edge of the stacks.

“Everything okay back here?”

“Yeah, just being clumsy as usual,” Harry’s face burns, keeping his eyes down on the rug.

“I’ve – uh – I’ve got class,” Liam stammers, shooting Harry a desperate glance before he slings his backpack over one shoulder to make a hasty exit. And if such a thing is possible, Harry thinks Liam Payne’s face is even redder than his own is. Of course, Harry’s not the one who had his co*ck out in the library just a minute ago. “I’ll see you guys later.”

“So…” Harry says, around a mouthful of pizza. “You and Liam?”

They’re in a booth near the back of the pizza parlor, nearly deserted at this hour, and Harry’s never been happier to see food in his life. It’s still raining, but thankfully Zayn was able to borrow Niall’s car for the afternoon so they didn’t have to take his bike. The parlor smells of hot dough and marinara and the windows are fogged from the heat of the kitchen, but even the warmth of thegiant brick ovens don't entirely dispel thelingering chill in the air.

Zayn’s hair falls around his face in soft, wet spikes, his thin frame shivering in his leather jacket. “Yeah. Just – we’re not – well, he’s not – really ready to say anything to anyone yet…so would it be okay if…?”

“I won’t say anything,” Harry nods. “But what about Perrie?”

“What about her?” Zayn raises a curious eyebrow as he spears a cherry tomato onto his fork.

“I thought you two were…you know.”

Zayn laughs. “What gave you that idea?”

“You gave her a ride on your bike after that footie game and you kept disappearing and the hickeys – ”

“Were from Liam,” Zayn confesses, biting down on his lip.

Harry thinks back to that first day he and Zayn hung out – he’d been so focused on Louis he hadn’t noticed much else – but now that he really thinks about it, whenever Liam was called off the pitch, he didn’t go to sit on the bench with the rest of the players. Harry hadn’t found anything odd about it at the time - just figured Liam was having a wee or a stretch – but now he realizes all those times conveniently coincided with Zayn’s cigarette breaks. And the other day – when they were putting together the baby’s room for Harry's sister – Zayn and Liam had disappeared forover twenty minutes to smoke, even though Liam doesn't smoke and they'd come back flushed-faced and out of breath...

“Holy sh*t,” Harry's eyes widen as the realization hits him. How could he have missed it? How could he have been so oblivious?

Zayn chuckles, “Yeah. Holy sh*t is right. I’ve probably got myself in a bit over my head.”

“Why do you say that?”Harry asks, chasing his straw with his mouth.

Zayn sighs and pushes his salad away from him – though he’s barely touched it – crossing his arms over his chest as he sinks back into the plush cushions of the booth. His eyes look sad as he gazes out at the car park, everything dim and gray and indistinct in the rain.

“I mean, I’m in art club and he’s the footie co-captain. I’m a bloke that likes to wear dresses and Liam…I dunno, like, he’s really sweet, but I sometimes feel like I might just be a phase for him? Like I’ll go to uni and be out and Liam will, I dunno, find some nice girl to make babies with and settle down.” Zayn winces at his own words, taking a tiny, defeated sip of his water.

Harry squeezes Zayn’s hand where it rests on the table. “Have you tried talking to him about it?”

“Have you talked to Louis?” Zayn retorts, eyes narrowed accusingly.

Harry blushes and shifts in his seat. “Not exactly, but it’s not the same,” Harry sighs, letting out of a puff of breath that stirs his fringe.

“How is it not the same?”

“I don’t think – I don’t think he feels like that, for me.”

“But you like him?” Zayn clarifies. Harry nods, resting his head in his hands. He’s still got another slice of pizza left, but suddenly he doesn’t feel very hungry.

“You might be surprised. You should feel him out,” Zayn shrugs with a knowing smirk.

“Did he say something?” Harry asks brightly.

“No, but he apologized to me. I mean, it’s been two years and its water under the bridge to me now, but he never even thought of apologizing until he met you. It was like he was trying to clear the air so that going forward, whoever got him next, would get a better Louis than I ever got. And you know, part of the reason he was so scared to be with me was that he was afraid Eleanor and Stan would dump him and well – I mean – they’re gone now and you’re still there so…that has to mean something, right?”

Harry nods, warmth spreading through his chestlike a nip of whiskey on a cold winter night. Maybe it isn’t hopeless after all. I mean, all the reasons it didn’t work with Zayn and Eleanor aren’t the same reasons it wouldn’t work with Harry. Which means, conceivably, it could work? Possibly? Maybe? But only if Louis feels the same.

“Zayn, for what it’s worth, I think you deserve someone that’s proud of you,” Harry says, lifting his pizza slice for another bite. “And if that’s not Liam, maybe it’s better to find out now, yeah?”

Zayn nods, looking contemplative as he gazes out the window again, the light and shadows through the rain-speckled glass falling over his face in a pattern like lace.

Harry thinks about what Zayn said for the rest of their meal and on the ride home. If life is all about taking risks, about opening yourself up to things and people and experiences, what’s the harm in finding out? The worst that can happen is that Louis won’t like him like that and then, well, at least he’ll know.

Harry’s phone buzzes when he gets inside the front door and he looks down at the number and frowns. “Hi, Jay,” he says, closing the door with his back. “Is everything all right?”

“Hi, love. Do you think you can come over and watch the twins tonight? I know its last minute, but –” Her voice catches, throat tight with tears.

“Yeah. Of course. Of course. I’ll be right there.”

The rest of the week passes in a blur, the days stacked precariously atop one another like a Jenga set, poised to topple at any moment. It rains the whole week and the cold and the dreariness settles deep into Harry’s bones. Any thoughts of talking to Louis are put off indefinitely.

The doctor thinks Fizzy is nearing the end (she’s been sick with viral infection for over a week, unresponsive to the prescribed course of medication) and nobody wants to miss her final moments. She hangs on much longer than the doctors originally estimated and it’s both a blessing and a curse. Everyone is tired and tetchy and emotional and prone to bouts of crying – including Harry himself – though he’s somewhat better at disguising it (having had years of practice burying his real feelings).

It’s a horrible time, but for the first time in a long time he feels needed. Harry’s at the Tomlinson’s with the twins all day – fixing their breakfast, getting them dressed and off to nursery, picking them up after, making afternoon snacks and dinner, then baths and bedtime. At four, they’re too young to grasp everything that’s going on, though they seem to sense discord; they’re often antsy and irritable and it takes more than the normal amount of coaxing to get them to take their baths and go to sleep.

The only time of the day Harry’s alone is while the twins are at nursery. He used to savor his free time, but now there’s too much of it and he’s scared to be by himself because when he’s alone, he thinks. He keeps himself busy tidying the house and doing the laundry. He cooks more than the usual amount, making casseroles and baking cookies by the dozens. No one seems to be in the mood to eat, so he mostly freezes everything. Sometimes, Zayn or Niall will come over in the afternoon and sit and do homework with him and eat the surplus of food, and it’s nice to have the company, to pretend that nothing is out of the ordinary when everything couldn’t be farther from ordinary.

The rest of the Tomlinson clan splits their time between home and the hospital, drifting in and out the front door like the tide. They all grieve in their own ways, but there’s a rhythm to their grief, and once Harry realizes it, he tries to use it to his advantage. Harry uses routine to force a sense of normalcy onto a surreal situation. He’s stricter with meal times and bath time with the girls and makes sure they’re in bed at eight precisely, no matter how much they whine and wheedle him for another story or song.

Harry’s learned that silence is the best tactic with Mark. He makes them both tea and places a cuppa near Mark’s right elbow and they sit at the counter together and don’t say much of anything. If Mark’s there in the morning, Harry sets the paper on the table along with his tea, opened up to the crossword, and the soft scritch of his pencil and the pattering rain outside are the only sounds in the tiny kitchen. Sometimes, Mark zones out in front of the TV at night and Harry sits with him, the air heavy with all the words they don’t say.

Jay cries a lot and Harry’s learned it’s best to distract her, to keep her mind off things. Harry leaves clean laundry for her to fold and iron, because he knows it makes her feel useful, like she has a purpose, if her hands are kept busy. He lets her plait the twins’ hair into grief-knotted braids and combs the waves out of their flossy-fine hair before bed.

Lottie mostly turns to her friends and boyfriend for support and he hears her clicking away on her phone and computer at all hours of the day and night, sending out a quiet SOS of grief. She’s the closest in age to Fizzy and they share a room, so they’re relentlessly competitive and territorial over their things. Harry knows she feels guilty, like it could just as easily have been her that was sick and Fizzy that was well. He knows she feels like she’s winning the space they fought over all their life in the most horrible way imaginable, in a way she’d never asked for.

Louis’ method of dealing is perhaps the worst of all – he comes back from the hospital drained and lifeless, a shadow of his former self. His eyes, which normally sparkle with mischief, are dull and flat, and he spends most of his time just staring out the window at the rain. He barely eats – and even then – only if Harry spoons it into his mouth like a child. Harry helps himstagger into the shower, turning away his eyes to preserve Louis’ modesty as he helps him behind the curtain, though Louis doesn’t even seem to notice his nakedness or care whether he's clean or not.

And there’s this other thing too. Harry and Louis have been sharing a bed, because it’s easier for Harry to stay the night so he can watch the girls the next day. It doesn’t feel right for him to stay in Fizzy’s bed and after one night on the lumpy sofa downstairs his back is all out of sorts, so when Jay suggests he sleep in Louis’ bed, he doesn’t protest.

The first night, Harry just holds Louis tightly like he’s trying to keep all his bones together, like he's a bomb Harry's trying to keep from detonating. But the next night, Louis ends up with his leg draped over Harry’s and his face in Harry’s neck. At first, when Louis starts to rock himself into Harry’s thigh, Harry thinks he’s asleep. It’s so dark and Louis is so quiet the whole time, Harry isn’t sure whether it’s really happening until Louis let out a little whimper into his neck and Harry feels the crotch of his sweats pulse as he has his org*sm.

After he comes, Louis is finally able to fall asleep, his face sandwiched in Harry’s armpit. Harry still has an erection and wants to go to the toilet to relieve it, but the bed is so small it’s impossible to move without waking Louis, so Harry just lays there, trying unsuccessfully to ignore the dull ache between his legs.

It happens three more times after that and when Louis rolls off Harry the second time Harry sees that Louis’ eyes are wide open, but unseeing and it chills him to the core. Louis isn't asleep, but it’s like he’s not aware of what he's doing or who he's doing it with. It's like he's not even there anymore. The dry humping is oddly lacking in intimacy and Harry often feels cold and hollow after – they don’t kiss and it’s not passionate or romantic by any stretch of the imagination – just a thing that happens that helps Louis get to sleep. He sleeps so little these days that Harry can’t deny him this one small thing and so he lies there passively each time as Louis gets off and well, if he gets off a time of two, no one’s the wiser.

Louis never mentions these instances – either in the moment or the next morning – and if it weren’t for the bruises on Harry’s hipbones and the dried, flaking cum in his pajama bottoms every morning, Harry would wonder if he made them up entirely.

Chapter 10

Chapter Text

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

On Friday, Fizzy unexpectedly wakes up and asks for a sip of water. By Sunday, she’s back home, a lingering cough the only evidence that she was ever sick. It’s a miraculous recovery by all accounts and they’re dazed with relief. As the Tomlinson’s readjust to life outside the hospital, Harry starts to feel like he’s no longer needed and after a big family breakfast on Sunday, he starts making his excuses to go home. He’s missed a whole week of school so it’s not like he needs an excuse, but when he looks around the table he realizes everyone belongs there but him.

He’s not sure when Louis’ house started to feel like home, but his throat feels tight at the prospect of returning to his own house, with its silences and the lingering ghost of his grandmother’s disapproval. He doesn’t blame his mum for having to work all the time - it’s his dad’s fault for leaving them with nothing - but that doesn’t stop him from missing her, from wanting her around. He can’t remember the last time he and his mum hung out, just the two of them. It feels like he lost two parents and not one when they left and he can’t help but feel it’s all his fault. He knows Gemma has a lot on her plate too - that the baby has forced her to grow up faster than she ever intended - but he misses when it was just the two of them banded together against their dad, against the world. Now she and Ed and the baby will be their own family and there’s no room for Harry in it.

He’s spent all week holding everyone together - and at the end of it all, it’s just him - alone with his books and his computer, and the gnawing feeling that there’s something more, something better.

Jay and Mark insist that Harry at least stay for dinner and Harry and Louis spend the hours between breakfast and then lying on Louis’ bed watching movies. Louis rests his head on Harry’s chest and Harry quietly plays with his hair as Louis dozes, drifting in and out of consciousness. Louis is still exhausted from the past week, but Harry can see him coming back to himself, bit by bit. He’s lost some weight in the past two weeks, but the color is slowly returning to his face and the dark circles under his eyes aren’t as pronounced. He even made a joke or two over breakfast and Harry’s just so, so relieved to have the old Louis back. Part of him wasn’t sure he’d ever see him again.

Harry gets up at some point while Louis is asleep and sits down at his desk, flipping open Louis’ laptop. The desktop is set to a picture of some footie team and Harry smiles to himself as he pulls up the web browser, trying to angle the glowing monitor so he doesn’t wake Louis. Harry hasn’t written anything in days - too exhausted and worried - but his fingers are twitching in anticipation as he pulls up the Google doc he’s been working on, rereading the last few paragraphs before he begins to type.

Elliot looks even worse than the previous day. His features are sunken and his skin is as white as a sheet of Xerox paper. His body emits a peculiar odor, like sodden autumn leaves, like rot.

"You need to eat," Charlie says, standing over the bed.

Elliot glimpses the steak knife Charlie is carrying in one hand and rolls his head away, gritting his teeth, the muscles in his neck strained. "No.” His protest is a merely a whisper, like the rasp of Velcro when it separates.

"You'll get sick if you don't."

"I'm already sick," Elliot snaps. His head is throbbing and even the small, imperceptible shifts of the light filtering in through the window shade seem to pierce right to his core.

"You won't die, you know, if that's what you were hoping for. But you will be in a hell of a lot of pain. And any hunger you feel now, it'll be worse, much worse. There's no telling what you'll do or who you'll hurt."

Elliot doesn't say anything as Charlie drags the blade across his wrist. He keeps his lips pursed in a thin line, as if he's fighting the urge to open his mouth. The cut is clean and efficient and Charlie moves it to Elliot's mouth quickly so he doesn't spill any.

“Harry?” a tiny voice calls. Harry blinks the harsh light of the computer screen from his eyes, spots swimming behind his vision. His shoulders ache from hunching over the laptop screen in concentration and his hands cramped and sore. He has no idea how much time passed, but the sun’s gone down and the room is dark, the furniture only vague outlines, like parked cars covered in snow. Louis is sitting up in bed, the blankets drawn up around him so that only his face peeks out. “‘M cold. Come back to bed.”

Harry saves his work and Louis holds out the covers for him to crawl under, the bedsprings groaning under the added weight. Louis nudges Harry’s socked feet with his cold, bare feet and slides his hands under the back of Harry’s jumper, seeking out the warm skin there. His small hands are like ice. “f*ck,” Harry jumps. “You’re freezing.”

Louis chuckles, nuzzling his cold nose in Harry’s neck. “What were you writing?”

“A new short story.”

“Mmm...maybe I can read it sometime?” Louis yawns, scratching the back of his head. His hair is sticking up endearingly and Harry fights the urge to pat it back into place.

“Yeah. I mean, it’s not done yeah, but yeah, if you want...”

Louis lets out a contented snuffle, nosing along Harry’s collarbone the way Pancake does when she’s trying to get his attention. It feels so right, having Louis snuggled up in his arms, all loose and sleepy and pliant. When Louis’ lips follow a second later, mouthing a bruise into the sensitive valley where Harry’s throat meets his shoulder, Harry lets out a shaky little breath. He wants to take whatever Louis is willing to give him, to let things happen in their own time, but he’s scared, scared that he’s just a way for Louis to pass the time or a rebound after Eleanor. He loves him so much and he knows he can’t do this halfway, not without breaking his own heart in the process.

Harry figures this is as good a time as any to talk. His fingers tighten reflexively in Louis’ hair as Louis sucks a sensitive spot behind his ear. “Lou, can we talk?”

Louis pulls away, frowning. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“No - it’s not...it’s nothing bad.” Harry flicks on the bedside lamp so he can see Louis’ face. His blue eyes are the color of sapphires in the low light, sparkling and inquisitive. “Do you remember when I first moved to Holmes Chapel? Like - do you remember me?” Harry asks all in one breath.

“I vaguely recollect it,” Louis smirks.

Harry frowns (it’s not quite the response he was expecting) but continues on, knowing he’ll never work up the guts to do it a second time. “Do you remember on Valentine’s Day, I like...I made everyone these Valentines...by hand?”

There’s a long pause while Louis carefully considers what Harry’s asking him and Harry doesn’t think he inhales once the entire time. He can feel his heartbeat in his head, the blood loud and pounding in his ears.

“Harry, it was a long time ago,” Louis huffs, shifting into an upright position. He tightens his arms around his waist, trying to stay warm outside of Harry’s embrace. “What does it matter?”

“Oh,” Harry says softly, disappointment punching through his lungs. He takes a puff of his inhaler and waits for it to take effect; Louis looks on concerned and attentive, stroking Harry’s arm idly while he waits for him to collect himself. Harry wishes he wouldn’t. Louis’ body language is kind and relaxed, but the words he’s saying are like jagged shards of ice ripping through Harry’s heart. “It’s just - you gave me a Valentine and...” Harry lets out a shuddering breath, “and I guess...I guess I just wanted to know why.”

Louis picks idly at a My Little Pony sticker one of the girls stuck to his bed frame, not meeting Harry’s eyes. “I dunno. Like I said, it was ages ago and anyway, it’s not a big deal. I mean, everyone gives those out in primary school.”

“No.” Harry’s chin trembles hard and he can feel his eyes filling up with tears. One splashes onto his leg, soaking into the material of his trousers. He feels stupid for crying, but he can’t stop himself. “No, they don’t. You were the only one. Who gave one to me.”

Louis’ brow creases in consternation. “Harry, what is it you want me to say? My mum made me write one to everyone in the class. It didn’t mean anything. It was just a stupid card. Why are you even bringing this up?”

“No reason. Sorry. Okay.” Harry nods so hard it feels like his head is going to fall off. “I’ll just - I’m gonna go,” he stumbles over his words. He somehow manages to stand up and get into his shoes without falling on his face. He’s shaking and the tears are so close to falling, burning at the backs of his eyes.

“Harry?” Louis raises an eyebrow questioningly.

Harry lifts his head, trying not to let hope bloom anew in his chest. “Yeah?”

“You’re not staying for dinner?”

“Oh, uh, I’ve got homework and stuff so…I should, I should get back to it...”

Louis shrugs, flipping the television back on. “Suit yourself.”

It’s funny – it’s only a little thing, inconsequential really – Harry’s not sure why he thought Louis would even remember, let alone ascribe meaning to it - but to Harry its what he’s lived for all these years. Everytime he doubted himself, everytime he thought he wasn’t enough, he’d look at that Valentine, look at those notes in his shoebox, and he’d think that someone noticed him, that someone cared. That he mattered. He’d built up this whole fantasy in his mind and he’s only now realizing it was constructed on termite-infested foundations and now everything is crumbling down around him.

On the way downstairs, Harry texts Zayn to pick him up. He somehow manages to endure several minutes of idle chit-chat with Jay while he waits, only half-listening as everything he’s held so carefully together inside him falls to pieces. But the second he closes the passenger door of Zayn’s mum’s car, he’s shaking apart, heaving ugly sobs into the other boy’s flannel shirt. Zayn smells of smoke and salt and lime as he leans across the console and takes Harry into his arms and the familiar scent makes Harry cry even harder.

“Oh, babe,” is all Zayn says, letting out a heavy sigh.

Harry stays home on Monday. He tells his mum his asthma is bothering him - which is partially true - every time he draws a breath it feels like everything inside him is being squeezed through a juice press. But mostly, it’s because he can’t bear to face Louis.

Harry doesn’t leave his bed the whole day - just stares at the walls as the sun moves over them in golden waves and then as shadows takes its place - and he’s plunged into darkness again. He doesn’t sleep or eat. He doesn’t read or write. He doesn’t watch TV. He doesn’t do anything but lie there. At dinner time, his mum comes in and turns on the light and sits down on the edge of his bed, rubbing his back through the thin material of his tshirt. That touch alone makes him want to burst into tears. His mum’s touch is so caring and considerate and Harry feels so small and ugly, so undeserving of any kindness. He’s barely hanging on by a thread and he knows the second someone asks him what’s wrong, any semblance of control will be gone.

“How are you feeling sweetie?”

Harry opens his mouth to speak, but all that comes out are two fat tears, which spring to his eyes and roll quickly down his cheeks.

“Oh love,” his mum says softly, drawing him into a hug. She runs a hand soothingly over his back as he cries, the other one cradling his head to her chest. Harry can’t remember the last time he cried this hard and this desperately, but once it starts he feels like he won’t ever stop. It’s that hiccupy, snotty, gross sort of crying that you do when you’re beyond caring how you look. He thought he’d let it all out in Zayn’s car, but it’s still there below the surface like a landmine, waiting for someone to accidentally trip it.

When Harry finally exhausts himself, his mum is there with a handful of tissues and a pitying smile. He blows his nose and wipes at his face, which feels puffy and raw to the touch. “Is this about Louis?” she asks knowingly.

“How did you know?” Harry chokes. Is he so transparent? Does everyone know? How humiliating.

Anne gives him a sad smile. “I’m your mum, Harry. Mums can sense these things. Do you want to talk about it?”

Harry shakes his head, crumpling a tissue into a ball in his fist. “No. I just - I just want to disappear,” he sniffles.

“Sssh,” she rubs his back. “You don’t mean that love.”

“I just - I wanted someone to love me so bad - I wanted it to be him,” he shudders, a dry sob tearing his chest like tissue paper. “I guess I overlooked everything that didn’t fit...”

His mum’s hand cards through his curls like she used to do when he was a baby. “A lot of people love you. You’re very loveable. And if Louis can’t see what a catch you are, it’s his loss okay? Not yours.”

Harry rolls his eyes, but he feels a little better. “You have to say that. You’re my mum.”

“I do not have to say that!” she protests. “You know, you have to love your children, but you don’t have to like them. I like you. I’d want you as my friend if I weren’t your mum. You’re so smart and talented and beautiful,” she says. “And you have a kind, sensitive heart. You turned out wonderfully, despite the fact that you had an awful childhood. And you’re going to be just fine. I know it seems like the end of the world now, but someday someone will love you the way you want to be loved. The way you deserve.”

Harry let out a sigh. “Thanks mum.”

“Anytime.” She squeezes him close, resting her chin on the top of his head. “How’s this? You take a shower and put on some clothes and I’ll take you out to eat, wherever you want.”

Harry sniffles, smiling weakly through his tears. “Really?”

“Yep. Just you and me, pal.”

The rest of the school week passes quietly as the cold weather sets in. The central heating system makes everyone sluggish and overtired and Harry catches more than one student nodding off during lessons. Harry dives headlong into his course work and is pleased to see his marks have gone up in several of his classes, despite his extended absence.

Harry isn’t intentionally avoiding Louis per-say; he’s just avoiding all the spots he might run into him on the school grounds. Harry has lunch with Zayn every day in the art room, except for Friday, when Zayn sneaks into town for lunch with Liam and Harry eats with Alma in the library. Harry only has one class with Louis and he’s the first one out his seat when the bell rings. In the hallway, he purposefully gets lost in the sea of bodies (he’s always been good at disappearing) and pretends he doesn’t hear when Louis call his name.

Jay’s let Harry off babysitting for the week, but Harry’s nights are still full. He reads part of the Phantom Tollbooth to the kids at the library on Tuesday night and they fight over who gets to sit closest to him and he feels a little swell of pride. He also agrees to be a reader for the literary magazine, on a provisional basis, provided that it doesn’t interfere with his course load, so he spends most of Wednesday and Thursday evening going over the student submissions. All in all, getting through his days is not the chore it once was. But it gets dark early and at night, when Harry’s alone in his room, the box under his bed beats like Poe’s tell-tale heart, keeping him awake. Louis’ words creep back into his mind like drifts of snow, making him cold again.

It was a long time ago -

What does it matter?

It’s not a big deal -

It didn’t mean anything -

It was just a stupid card...

Each word is like a nail in the coffin of what might-have-been. And though Louis will never know it (and Harry will never tell him) Louis has dug his own grave. The fleeting kisses, the quiet, grief-heavy nights of Louis getting himself off against Harry’s thigh - are nothing but a memory now - best relegated to the shoebox under Harry’s bed.

The football match on Friday against the Winsford Diamonds is an important one that will secure the Hurricanes standing in the finals - the whole school will be out in the stands to watch - and Harry begrudgingly agrees to go with Zayn on the condition that Zayn will help him with an art project he’s been stressing over.

Zayn’s suspiciously upbeat when he meets Harry in the car park after class, whistling a Justin Timberlake tune under his breath and not even reaching for his cigarette pack as he normally would. He remains quiet on the subject until they get to his house. Tricia chats with Harry about his writing while they wait around for tea to be ready and Harry asks about her work. Zayn’s sisters cast quick, longing glances in Harry’s direction as they pretend to do homework at the kitchen table, blushing and darting their eyes away when he meets their gaze with a smile.

“My sisters are mad about you. They’d be so disappointed if they knew how much you love co*ck,” Zayn whispers to Harry as they climb the stairs, making Harry trip and nearly spill his tea.

They retreat to Zayn’s room, sitting amidst the chaos of his scattered clothes and various art experiments. Harry picks up a skateboard with palm trees spray-painted on the deck and studies it with interest while Zayn flops onto his bed. Eventually, Harry sits down, cross-legged on the foot of the mattress.

“What’re you so happy about?” Harry asks, throwing a crisp at Zayn. Zayn catches it and pops it in his mouth with a loud crunch.

“Liam and I talked,” Zayn beams, wrestling the foil bag of crisps from Harry.

“Oh? So...everything’s good?” Harry pries curiously. Harry doesn’t know Liam that well - and the interactions they have had are hardly typical - a car accident, an asthma attack, a fist-fight, a public blowj*b and a dead cat - which builds an odd impression to be sure. But if he makes Zayn happy, Harry figures he’s okay.

“He asked me to the winter formal,” Zayn practically squeals, hugging a pillow to his chest.

“Seriously?! Wow. That’s great Zayn. I’m really happy for you.” And Harry is happy. He just would be happier if things were sorted between him and Louis.

“Ughhh, I have so much to do to get ready,” Zayn sighs, but he’s grinning as he opens his laptop.

“Like what?”

“Transportation and picking out a boutineer,” Zayn ticks off on his fingers. “Figuring out what color Liam’s wearing so I can coordinate my dress color and -”

“Wait, you said dress,” Harry cuts Zayn off.

“Well, what else would I wear?” Zayn demands, tone a bit hurt.

“I’m sorry - I didn’t - It’s just - don’t you think people will like - talk or whatever?” Harry asks, trying to keep his tone non combative. Harry’s seen Zayn in a dress and so has Louis and most likely Liam, and he looks beautiful, but not everyone is so accepting or understanding. Harry chews his lip and tries not to feel bad about the slightly deflated look on Zayn’s face. Sometimes being a good mate means telling someone something they don’t want to hear. He’s only trying to protect Zayn. Still, it seems a little counterintuitive - telling a victim to not do things to attract attention - when really he should be telling bullies not to bully.

“They can talk all they want,” Zayn says, a little defensively. “Liam wants to go with me and I’m going. In a dress or not at all.”

“Sorry,” Harry says softly, resting a hand on Zayn’s knee. “You know, I think a royal blue would go really nice with your skin tone.”

“Really?” Zayn beams. Harry nods and returns the other boy’s smile, but he can’t help the sinking feeling in his stomach as Zayn turns his laptop to show Harry some possible dress choices.

The match is a tense one, due to both teams being so evenly matched and both sides putting forth their best efforts. By the end of the second half, Harry thinks he hasn’t got any nails left to chew and his voice is raw from shouting. He can’t remember ever being to a match so exciting - he only has hazy recollections of his own dad playing - and most of those memories are clouded by the abuse he’d endured when his dad’s team lost or the drunken rows his parents had when his dad had one too many at the pub after they’d won. Before he met Louis, Harry could only remember one time he associated football with happiness - when he was three or four years old and they’d held an important charity match - and his dad paraded him around the field on his shoulders.

Today, Harry’s finding he can recall that day with fondness and only a lingering trace of bitterness. He even wonders, for the first time, what became of his dad. It’s been ten years and Harry’s never wondered or cared before now and it makes him think that maybe things are getting better. He hasn’t forgiven his dad for destroying his childhood, but he’s come to realize the only one capable of ruining his present is himself. His dad doesn’t have that hold on him anymore, a prospect that’s as liberating as it is frightening.

Harry’s enjoying the match despite himself. He’s never seen Zayn smile so much and despite his mixed feelings about his situation with Louis, he’s happy to be outside after spending all week cooped up indoors catching up on coursework and sorting through literary magazine submissions. Zayn and Niall are both jumping up and down like lunatics on the sideline, their cheeks flushed from the adrenaline and the cool evening air. Louis is amazing - as always - and he and Liam are astonishingly in sync with each other as they drive the ball back and forth down the pitch. Harry feels a swell of pride in his chest watching Louis play, though he knows he hasn’t got any right to it. It’s not like Louis is his boyfriend or anything.

Still, when Louis scores the winning goal with only a minute to spare and the entire stadium explodes into applause, Harry’s clapping harder than any of them. Liam and Andy hoist Louis up on their shoulders and Niall and Zayn draw Harry into a crushing threeway hug that squeezes the air out of Harry’s lungs in the best way. It occurs to Harry that he’s going to remember this day and these people for the rest of his life and a heady sense of nostalgia washes over him at once. He’s finally starting to replace those old, bad memories of childhood with happy ones. He likes to think that when he’s old and gray, he’s going to look back on this time as one of the best in his life.

Harry’s still riding that wave of post-match adrenaline when Louis invites everyone back to his house to celebrate. He tries to sneak away, and only makes it as far as the carpark when Niall’s arm comes down around his shoulders. “You’re riding with me, yeah?” the blond boy asks with an effortless smile, crumbling Harry’s admittedly already weak resolve.

Amy’s hitching a ride with the girls, so it’s just him and Niall, which Harry is grateful for. Harry hates fumbling his way through small talk and Niall is always content to go with the flow and doesn’t press Harry to make conversation, just dials up the radio another notch and gives Harry a cheery smile.

They stop at Tesco’s on the way, where Niall’s older brother Greg works, to load up on alcohol and by the time they get to Louis’ house, the place is nearly unrecognizable. Harry’s so used to his quiet, domestic Wednesday and Saturdays babysitting and tonight the house looks like an entirely different animal. The house is ablaze with light and there’s a thumping bass line bleeding out into the cold, still air that makes Harry’s teeth vibrate in his skull. Kids are spilling out onto the front stoop to get fresh air or smoke cigarettes or snog in secluded corners and Harry feels a weird sort of possessiveness at the sight of them all over the Tomlinson’s property. They don’t belong there. Harry belongs there.

Harry spots Zayn leaning against the railing smoking a cigarette, but Zayn stubs it out when he sees them, jogging over to help unload the boot. Zayn’s already slightly tipsy, but he’s a happy drunk, stumbling up the walkway with a bag of booze in one arm and his free arm around Harry’s waist. It makes Harry want to cry for some reason. The way Niall and Zayn always seem to take care of him, to make an effort to make him feel included, when the truth is that maybe Harry doesn’t belong here. Maybe they just feel sorry for him.

Louis’ house is jam-packed with bodies, the conversation at a dull roar over the blaring music and Harry wants nothing more than to dissolve into the carpet. Liam, red-cheeked and beaming, beckons Zayn over and for a minute Zayn manages to hold onto Harry before he loses him in the press of people. Shouts go up at Niall’s arrival and he’s handing out bottles of alcohol to people left and right like he’s Santa Claus and Christmas has come early.

Harry spots Louis in the dining room - as if he could miss him - standing on the table delivering a drunken speech to the crowd amassed before him. Harry’s heart sinks. It’s like, for a bit, he forgot how popular Louis actually is. When it was just the two of them Louis seemed so different from his brash, public persona - thoughtful and well-spoken and occasionally insecure - that Harry almost forgot there was another side to him. This other Louis is always the center of attention, quick to whip out a joke from his arsenal that will have everyone in stitches, bossy and loud and demanding. And Harry doesn’t hate it - he can even sort of objectively admire the way there always seems to be a crowd around Louis, like lesser planets revolving around the sun - but this isn’t his Louis. The Louis whose socked feet entangle with Harry’s in his narrow twin bed, the Louis he cooks dinner for on Wednesday nights, the Louis who puts on different voices when he reads his sisters bedtime stories.

Of course, Harry knows now that Louis was never really his - that maybe what Louis needs is someone more multi-faceted and dynamic, someone to complement all the aspects of his personality, not just some. Harry’s just a quiet little book nerd who gets anxious in a big crowd and Louis is larger-than-life. Louis can fit in anywhere, changing to fit the atmosphere as seamlessly as a chameleon. And Harry has no doubts he’ll go on to do great things and that wherever he goes, he’ll never be in need of friends. Not like Harry, who struggles to make conversation with strangers, who would much prefer a good book than a party on a Friday night.

Harry hardly knows anyone - though it seems as if their whole school is there - and all his friends are otherwise occupied. Liam and Zayn and huddled together on the couch, smiling at each other and sipping their beers. Perrie’s trying to do a handstand with Josh’s help, but they’re both pissed and keep collapsing into giggles. Niall’s snogging Amy against the wall of the living room. Even Eleanor is there, blending effortlessly into the crowd and belonging in a way that Harry could never hope to. Harry already regrets coming and when ten minutes pass and no one’s struck up a conversation with him, he quietly slips away upstairs. Louis’ parents are out but the girls are all huddled together in Louis’ room watching a movie and they seem excited to see Harry in a way that no one downstairs is.

They’ve just finished the Little Mermaid and started on Shrek when the door creaks open, light spilling in from the hall. “Are you girls okay?” Louis asks, peeking his head around the door. “I brought pizza.” The box in Louis’ hand wavers slightly when he sees Harry there, Daisy in his lap and a half-naked Barbie doll in his right hand.

“Harry, what are you doing here?”

Harry blushes, suddenly feeling very stupid, like he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t. “This is more my scene,” he admits sheepishly. Louis sets the pizza box and a wad of napkins onto the bed and litre of soda on the side table and the girls descend on it like vultures.

“I just - I didn’t expect to see you here tonight.”

“I’m sorry - I could go -” Harry tries to disentangle himself from the blankets and pile of dolls on the bed, but Louis clasps his wrist.

“Please. Don’t.” The words sound like they’re being pried out of Louis like rotted teeth, like he’d rather be doing anything than having this conversation. “I didn’t mean it like that. You just ran out of here pretty fast the other day is all.”

“It didn’t mean anything,” Harry says icily, throwing Louis’ own words back at him. “I mean, it’s not a big deal, like you said. What does it matter if I stay or go?”

Louis’ eyes widen at the tone Harry is taking with him. He wrenches Harry up by his wrist with surprising force and drags him out into the hall, closing the door so the girls can’t hear. “Is that what this is about? About the Valentine thing?” he demands.

“Well, what else would it be about?” Harry asks, angrily.

“You shouldn’t go through other people’s stuff,” Louis snaps, hands on his hips. “And you shouldn’t tease them about it.” Harry stares at Louis, who is practically radiating anger in waves and what’s he got to be mad about? He’s the one who unknowingly rejected Harry.

“Louis, what are you on about?” Harry asks, exasperated and completely bewildered by the direction the conversation is taking.

“You know Harry, I thought you of all people wouldn’t be the type to make fun of someone.”

“Make fun of? Louis, I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about. I would never - ”

“You went through my shoebox,” Louis accuses him.

“What shoebox? Louis - I was mad because I kept that Valentine you gave me - because to me, it meant something, when it so obviously didn’t to you -”

“So you really didn’t...you really don't know?” Louis trails off, understanding softening the twin flames of anger in his blue eyes.

“Listen...maybe I should just go. I don’t want to stay where I’m not wanted.”

“Not wanted? Seriously?” Louis snorts, rolling his eyes. “Just. Just stay here a second.” Louis disappears into his room, leaving Harry standing in the hallway, completely confused. When Louis reemerges a second later, he’s holding a shoebox in his hands. He grabs Harry’s hand, dragging him down the hall to his parents room. “Sit,” he commands, practically shoving Harry onto the bed.

“In Year Four, I asked to borrow a pencil from you in Maths,” Louis says, pulling a chewed-up blue pencil from the box with the initials MHS on it. Marcel Harry Styles. “And when you asked for it back, I pretended I lost it. But I didn’t. In Year Five, you traded me a candy bar for my banana at lunch,” he says, pulling out a Cadbury Crunchy wrapper. “Even though it’s obviously a sh*t trade,” Louis rolls his eyes, pulling another thing out. “This is the sugar packet from the night we talked at Cobbles Tea Room. And this CD has the song on it that was playing when we kissed on the hood of my car. And these are your broken glasses from when Stan pushed you down the stairs in Sixth form-”

“I wondered where those went,” Harry says softly, stunned, as he runs a thumb over the fractured lens. Why would Louis keep all this stuff? Before this year, they’d barely ever talked more than a few words.

“This is a picture of a unicorn you drew for Phoebe. I had to trade her a whole bag of sweets for it and obviously she got the better end of the deal because no offence mate, but you’re an awful artist,” Louis smirks. “And this is the story you wrote for the literary journal. I know I asked for a copy, but I couldn’t wait. I made Perrie give me a copy of the one you submitted.”

“Louis - I don’t - ”

Louis continues on, undeterred. “This is the inhaler you dropped on the bus in Year Seven-”

“I thought I’d lost that - Those are expensive, you know - my mum practically killed me for losing it,” Harry pouts.

“And this - this is the Valentine you gave me - and I wanted to tell you but I never did - it was the best one I ever got.” Harry lifts the Valentine with trembling hands, tears clouding his vision. The glitter is yellowing at the edges and there’s a small tear in the faded pink construction paper, but it’s unmistakably the one he made for Louis. He’d never expected to see it again. He’d never expected to see any of it again. He’d never expected someone to keep something he gave them, least of all Louis.

“Why - why do you have all this stuff?” Harry asks, voice trembling with emotion.

“Because I love you, you idiot. Because I can’t remember a time when I didn’t love you.”

“But you - we - we never talked,” Harry protests, voice wet with tears.

“You were the first boy I ever looked at that way and it scared the sh*t out of me. I didn’t want to like boys that way. I didn’t want to like you that way. I told you it was Zayn that first made me question my sexuality, but I lied. It was you. It was always you.”

“I thought you hated me,” Harrys says in a small voice, unable to meet Louis’ eyes.

Louis takes Harry’s hands in his and they’re small and slightly cold, just like always. “I could never. I hated myself. I was a coward. I saw the other kids teasing you and I did nothing because I was afraid they’d do the same to me. Do you know how many times I tried to work up the courage to talk to you? Liam Payne running over your cat was the best thing that ever happened to me - no offense - because it gave me a reason to talk to you.”

“You said - you said you didn’t even know my name-”

“I lied. I lied about a lot of things. And I’m sorry. I guess...I guess I was afraid that I liked you more than you liked me.”

“How could you think that? Even for a second?”

“I thought maybe you pitied me. Because of everything with Eleanor. Because of my sister...I thought you were just being nice, because you're you.”

“But when I brought up the Valentine - ”

“I thought you had found my box. I couldn’t think of why else you would bring that up. I was so mad that you snooped I pretended it didn’t mean anything.”

“But you love me?” Harry asks breathlessly, finally meeting Louis’ eyes. He’s surprised to find they’re filled with tears, same as his.

“I loved you when you were Marcel and I love you as Harry and with your permission, I’m just going to keep on loving you.”

“You don’t need my permission,” Harry says softly, carding his fingers through Louis’ hair. “I love you too. I always have. But are you - are you sure I’m what you want? I mean - you’re popular and I’m a nerd and you have a ton of friends and until recently I had none...”

“Harry, that stuff doesn’t matter to me. I thought it did once. But nothing means anything if I can’t have you.” Harry grins, and for the first time ever, he’s the first to lean forward into their kiss. Louis’ lips are soft and chapped and his stubble is rough against Harry’s cheek, the slight, rasping pain taking the edge off Harry’s desperation. Harry cups Louis’ face in his hands, deepening their kiss as they tip backwards onto the bed.

“I love you so much,” Harry gasps, between kisses, as Louis sucks at his neck.

“Love you too. Never get tired of saying it,” Louis grins, unbuttoning Harry’s shirt so he can slid his cold hands into the opening, skimming over Harry’s chest.

“Lou - your sisters - ” Harry groans as Louis kisses a trail down his stomach, stopping to run his tongue around Harry’s navel.

“Are watching Shrek,” Louis says, popping the button on Harry’s jeans with his teeth.

“But your party-” Harry wheezes, feeling Louis’ warm breath against him through the thin cotton barrier of his pants.

“No one will miss us for a few minutes,” Louis insists, mouthing Harry’s thickening length through his pants. Harry’s hips buck up involuntarily and Louis smirks as he peels Harry’s pants down.

The smile drops off his face when Harry’s co*ck springs free and he lets out a shaky breath. “f*ck. You’re big.”

“Sorry,” Harry blushes, pushing himself up on his elbows. “You don’t have to-”

“No, I want to. Besides, I like a challenge,” Louis grins, licking his lips so they glisten in the dark. He gives Harry a tentative lick and Harry’s whole body shudders at the wetness and heat. It’s not just that no one’s ever touched him there - it’s that Louis is touching him there - his lips all red and shining. It’s so sexy because it’s Louis between his thighs, Louis’ big blue eyes staring up at him, so eager to please, to make this good for Harry. Harry thinks this might well be the shortest blowj*b he ever receives (well really, it’s the only one so far.)

Once Louis has Harry’s co*ck wet with spit, thighs trembling in anticipation, he grips the base of Harry’s co*ck and moves his mouth down over Harry, lips folded over his teeth. Harry reaches down and threads his fingers through Louis’ hair, trying to keep his grip loose so he doesn’t hurt him.

“You’re so beautiful,” Harry pants, voice breaking off into a moan. “I’ve - I’ve wanted this for so long.”

Louis keeps bobbing up and down on Harry, never breaking eye contact. Harry’s pictured getting a blowj*b for ages, but never quite like this. It’s not obscene or dirty like some of the p*rn he’s watched - it’s oddly intimate with Louis’ slightly watering eyes never leaving his - the wet slurping sounds of his mouth and Harry’s uneven breathing the only sounds in the room. Harry’s body is coiled tight like a spring, abdomen clenched, arms shaking with the effort of holding himself up so he can watch Louis - his Louis - suck him off. As wound as tight as he is, he knows it won't last long.

“Lou, I’m gonna - ” Harry warns, fighting to keep his eyes open through his org*sm. But Louis doesn’t stop, increasing his attention to Harry’s sensitive head, laving his tongue all around it like an ice-cream cone. Harry’s thighs jerk once and then he’s cumming hard in Louis’ mouth with a low, gravelly moan. Louis keeps licking him until he’s clean and too-too sensitive and then he pulls Harry into a kiss so Harry can taste himself on Louis’ tongue. Harry’s body is completely loose and limp in Louis' arms as they kiss slowly and languidly like they have all the time in the world. Harry realizes with a start that they do.

When they break apart, Louis’ eyes are bright, pupils blown wide with lust. “Thank you. That was amazing. You’re amazing.”

“Are you going to thank me every time I do that?” Louis laughs.

“Probably,” Harry admit sheepishly as he pulls his pants back up. “Why, do you plan on doing it again?”

“As much as you’ll let me,” Louis says and it’s meant to be cheeky, but it comes out soft and fond and punches the breath out of Harry’s lungs.

“Do you want me to - to do you?” Harry gestures vaguely between their bodies.

Louis blushes as Harry’s eyes trail down to the wet spot at the front of Louis’ sweats. “I kind of already...”

“Oh. Oh,” Harry bites down on his lip. “f*ck that’s...that’s sexy.”

“I should um, change, and get back down there. Everyone will be wondering where I went.”

“Yeah,” Harry nods vigorously. “Of course.” Louis must see Harry’s expression fall because he twines his fingers with Harry’s and brushes a soft kiss over his lips.

“Will you stay over tonight? I think I owe you some cuddling.”

Harry’s face breaks into a smile that’s so big it hurts his cheeks. “Yeah. ‘Course.”

Chapter 11

Chapter Text

~Oh, I feel overjoyed when you listen to my words.

I see them sinking in. Oh, I see them crawling underneath your skin...~

I hear you calling in the dead of night

While Louis is in the loo getting changed, Harry ducks his head into Louis’ room to check on the girls before he goes downstairs. They’re huddled together on Louis’ bed, a tangle of arms and legs and flyaway blond hair that’s difficult to pick apart in the dim bluish glow of the television. “Just wanted to say goodnight,” Harry says softly, stooping down to give the closest girl a hug.

“Will you be here in the morning?” Phoebe yawns sleepily, rubbing her face into Harry’s chest as he lifts her up.

Harry bites back a smile, feeling slightly giddy at the thought. It’s no secret that the girls love him and want him around (even Lottie who’s too cool to admit it), but knowing Louis wants him there makes it all the better. Harry no longer has to feel like he’s tiptoeing around the other boy’s mood-swings, trying to maintain a bystander’s distance. Louis loves him. The words are like a magic spell drawing Harry out of a long coma and he still can’t quite convince himself he’s awake.

“Yeah. I’ll be here.” And every morning after, he thinks but doesn’t say aloud.

“Will you make us breakfast?” Daisy asks excitedly, tugging on the hem of Harry’s shirt as Harry bends down to hug her.

Harry pauses, rubbing his chin as he pretends to consider. “If you brush your teeth and wash your faces and get into bed by ten thirty.” Fizzy groans at the terms, but readily accepts a hug, clinging to Harry just a little bit longer than the others.

Lottie looks up from where she’s leaning back against the headboard, rapidly texting someone on her mobile. She looks more like Louis everyday - not just physically - but in the challenging glint in her blue eyes, the turned-up, rebellious tilt of her chin. “I’m not hugging you,” she deadpans, returning to her mobile.

“Ahh, you’re too cool for me now, huh?” Harry teases.

“I was always too cool for you,” Lottie rolls her eyes, looking so much like Louis it makes his chest hurt. Harry tries not to let it get to him. He knows it’s not just him - Lottie’s started making her mum drop her off a block away from school so her friends won’t see - but it still stings. Harry never went through that teenage rebellion phase himself, but then, he couldn’t really afford to alienate the only parent he had.

“Guess you’re too cool for blueberry pancakes then,” Harry says slowly. Lottie’s big blue eyes briefly flash with excitement before she schools her face back into an expression of nonchalance. So much like her brother; cards played close to her chest.

“Throw a cup of coffee into the deal and I might think of hugging you,” she negotiates.

“One cup. And you don’t tell your mum.”

Lottie smirks, reaching up to give him a quick hug. “As if I’d tell her anything anyway.”

The party goes on for another four hours, until someone throws up in the front garden and one of the neighbors threatens to call the police. Harry doesn’t know much about parties, but he supposes by any measure, it’s been a success. In all honesty, he’s just happy it’s over. He’s trying to come out of his shell more, but he thinks he might not be the partying type. For Louis, being social seems to recharge his batteries, feeding his appetite for excitement and gossip, but for Harry it’s oftentimes just exhausting. As the party’s host, Louis makes sure to mingle with everyone, but Harry finds it easier to deal with just one or two people at a time. He spends most of the evening wedged into one corner of the couch, playing cards with Liam and Zayn and shouting to be heard over the music, and doesn’t drink anything stronger than co*ke all night.

As the party breaks up, Louis makes sure everyone has a designated driver and calls cabs or arranges rides for those who don’t. He’s entirely sober and in command as he stands on the front stoop in the cold night air, breathe wreathing his head in white clouds, as he waves people off down the driveway.

While the house empties out, Harry gathers half-empty bottles and rubbish into a bin bag and wipes down all the counters and surfaces. It’s just a stop-gap measure until he can do a proper tidying in the morning. He’s exhausted - both from the late hour and the effort of making small talk all evening - but he wants to make sure the house is tidy when Louis’ parents get home. By the time Louis shuts and locks the front door, sagging against it, Harry’s taken the rubbish out to the kerb to be collected in the morning and shut off all the downstairs lights.

“Thank you,” Louis sighs, collapsing into Harry’s arms gratefully. “You’re amazing.”

“’s no big deal,” Harry insists, voice slow and drawn out with tiredness, like taffy being slowly pulled through a machine.

Louis slides an arm around Harry’s waist, kissing the side of his face. “Come on love. Let’s get to bed.”

Discounting earlier in the evening when Louis told Harry he loved him - Harry doesn’t think he’s ever heard anything quite so nice.

Lucky. Harry never thought that word applied to him before - never even believed in the construct of luck until Louis loved him - but now he can’t think of a more appropriate word. When Louis rolls over in the night and reaches for Harry without thought, like he’s returning to something after a long time away, like he’s coming home, Harry feels lucky lucky lucky. And the best part is that the feeling only seems to grow, to germinate like a seed in his chest, the small green shoots of love winding their way through the ventricles of his heart, snaring him. Harry thinks that no matter how much time passes, he’ll never stop feeling insanely, overwhelmingly lucky.

At school on Monday, on their way to English lessons, their shoulders bumping for how closely they walk together, Louis reaches for Harry’s hand and takes it into his own so easily, so effortlessly, as if it costs him nothing, as if the gesture itself is an everyday occurrence. But in Harry’s eyes it’s everything. Harry tries to bite back his grin, lowering his face bashfully as they continue their conversation, but he feels like he’s broadcasting the truth with every cell of his body, skin sparking like a live wire. He thinks that even the astronauts can see it from space - there’s nothing subtle about how they look at each other - nothing in their gestures or expressions that can be misconstrued as anything else but love.

Harry’s never felt this way - dizzy and slightly drunk with happiness - when he stubs his toe rounding a corner too fast, when he gets his Maths test back with a C+ scrawled across the top in red, he barely even notices, just resolves to do better, to be less clumsy. Things that once sent him spiraling into depression or a bad mood seem like minor annoyances now, waved away as simply as batting a fly. Inevitably, someone calls them fa*gs as they’re walking hand and hand down the hallway - inevitably it’s Stan – and while Harry briefly feels like a cup of ice-water’s been dumped down his back, he manages to reanimate his limbs and keep moving. It’s nothing he hasn’t heard before and it doesn’t hurt quite so much as it used to now that he has Louis. When Louis moves to retaliate, blue fire in his eyes, Harry simply squeezes his hand, tugging him onward. “Come on. He’s not worth it, babe.”

Of course, Liam fonding all over Zayn helps to alleviate some of the scrutiny they’re under. Liam’s only previous relationship was the three years he dated Danielle, a dancer in upper Sixth, but in spite of the length of their courtship, he never seemed smitten with her the way he is with Zayn. Harry catches Liam awkwardly lugging Zayn’s art portfolio for him between lessons and lingering at his locker after last bell like an obedient puppy waiting for his master to return.

Whatever Harry might have thought of Liam Payne before, he’s seeing him in an entirely new light now. Liam obviously adores Zayn - falling all over himself to open doors for him and bringing him little presents between lessons – bright orange clementines and art magazines and hand-written notes that at quick glance have more than their fair share of hearts scribbled on them. In public, Zayn accepts Liam’s attentions grudgingly, with the air of a weary, put-upon queen being showered with gifts from her peasants, but in private, he smiles a lot more and he often gets a dreamy, blanked out expression that Harry attributes to Liam.

If anyone’s shocked that there are not one, but two gay footie captains, no one dares say it to their faces. And even the rumors and gossip swirling around Harry and Louis can’t penetrate Harry’s bubble of happiness. It’s funny - but not surprising - that after wasting so much time being scared or dating the wrong people, once they’re actually together, things just sort of slot into place. Despite the confusing, sexually-frustrating first weeks of their friendship and years of pushing down their feelings for one another, when they finally committed to dating, it was like there had never been any question to begin with that they’d end up together.

If Harry’s surprised by anything, it’s how little actually changes. He still mostly eats his lunch with Zayn in the art studio, though sometimes Louis or Liam will join them now. He’s still writing feverishly. He still spends free period with Alma in the library. He still babysits the Tomlinson girls twice a week. Of course, he is snogging Louis quite a bit more than he used to, but that’s to be expected.

There are two weeks left before winter formal and though Harry has been nothing but outwardly supportive of Zayn’s decision to wear a dress, inside he’s been in turmoil over it.

One Saturday, when Louis and Harry are cuddled together in his bed watching a movie, Pancake curled between them like a comma in a sentence, Louis turns his attention away from the movie to study Harry’s face. Harry’s trying to pay attention, he really is – Love Actually is one of his favorite movies – but he keeps thinking of winter formal and the thought fills him with dread. Louis had asked him a week ago, showing up at Harry’s locker between lessons with a vanilla cupcake and hand-drawn card. Harry should be thrilled – and he is – but he can’t stop thinking of the piles of fabric amassing in Zayn’s room, of his voice excitedly prattling on about one detail or another of the construction.

“All right, Harry?” Louis asks, pausing the movie.

Harry tries to smile, but it feels forced and unnatural. “Sorry, I…I’m worried about winter formal, I guess,” he huffs, twisting his hands in his lap.

Louis’ smile falters slightly, but he quickly composes his face into an expression that’s the right mixture of attentiveness and concern. “If you’re that worried, we don’t have to go together –”

“No, no, it’s not that,” Harry rushes to reassure him, threading their fingers together where they’re resting atop the blanket. “I’m really happy we’re going together.” Louis’ shoulders visibly relax and Harry gives him a tiny lopsided smile, though his gut is still churning.

“It’s just – I’m worried about Zayn—” Harry chews the inside of his cheek, working the tender skin until the taste of blood – hot and coppery – floods his mouth. He knows Zayn wants to keep the dress a surprise from Liam - which means keeping it a surprise from everyone - but he worries Zayn’s surprise won’t garner the sort of reaction he thinks it will.

“He’s a big boy,” Louis shrugs. “It’s not like he’ll be the only one bringing another boy to the dance.”

“Yeah, but he will be the only one wearing a dress,” Harry says softly, gazing up at Louis from under the fringe of his lashes.

“sh*t,” Louis curses. “They’re going to crucify him.”

“Yeah,” Harry worries his bottom lip between his teeth, not feeling much better about the whole thing. “But like – he’s so excited about it – he and his mum went to London to buy fabric last weekend and they’ve been sewing all week – and I don’t have the heart to tell him…”

Louis gives Harry’s hand a quick squeeze. “Do you trust me?”

Harry rolls his eyes. “Of course.”

Louis beams. “Great. I’m going to make things right, okay? No one will say a word about Zayn wearing a dress. I can promise you that. They probably won’t even notice,” Louis says with a wicked glint in his eyes, a devious smile curling his top lip.

“Louis-” Harry starts, not liking the look on Louis’ face one bit. Louis has a reputation for being a prankster at school. Harry’s sure whatever he’s planning will get them in trouble or worse yet, expelled.

“Just trust me.” Louis gives Harry a deep, probing kiss that makes him practically forget what he was worrying about in the first place. He still doesn’t feel entirely settled about the matter, but he feels a little better now that he’s unburdened to Louis and he sleeps soundly that night with Louis’ head tucked under his chin.

It’s been two weeks and Harry still can’t quite get over it. It feels like a dream, waking up with Louis in his bed, with Pancake dozing between them, their own little self-contained family unit. Harry feels safe in a way he hasn’t in years – with everyone he loves under one roof – his mum and Gemma and Louis and Pancake. Lately everything in his life feels like a miracle – that he has a roof over his head and doesn’t want for food or companionship or love – when for so long he didn’t know from one day to the next where his next meal would come from or if he would have a bed to sleep in. Harry’s no longer wrenched out of sleep, gasping from nightmares, feeling a phantom lash at the back of his legs as hot tears spill silently down his cheeks. These days, more often than not, he wakes up smiling.

On Sunday, Harry’s up before Louis, which affords him the opportunity to watch the boy unobserved. He’s beautiful, which Harry always knew, but it’s a different sort of beauty when he’s asleep – not the animated, sharp-edged allure he has in public – preening under everyone’s attentions, flitting about like a bright canary with glittering, expressive eyes. In sleep, his features are soft and lax, long eyelashes casting fan-shaped shadows on heat-flushed cheeks, upper lip beaded with moisture. He looks unguarded and vulnerable, younger somehow and infinitely more precious.

The sharp, golden planes of Louis’ face are like something carved from light and Harry has the overwhelming urge to immortalize his beauty somehow – to capture it in frantic pencil-strokes or in the lines of a poem – though he’s just as happy to lie still, with Louis pillowed in his arms. Louis gives a sleepy yawn, eyelashes fluttering rapidly, reminding Harry of a sparrow’s wings flapping in a dusty shaft of sunlight.

“Are you watching me sleep, you creep?” Louis smirks, gazing up at Harry through one cracked eye, like a watchful cat.

“So what if I am?” Harry grins, pressing his lips to the blue vein at Louis’ temple. Louis’ eyes flutter shut and he makes a contented sound in the back of his throat as he tries to go back to sleep. Harry lowers his face, mouthing a kiss over Louis’ collarbone that has Louis’ hands curling in the sheets.

“Mmm…’s too early,” Louis protests blearily.

“No such thing,” Harry laughs, jostling Pancake out of place as he swings a leg over Louis to straddle his hips. Pancake hops to the floor with a disgruntled yowl, licking daintily at her ruffled back fur and Harry spares her an apologetic glance.

“Ugh, can’t believe I fell in love with a morning person,” Louis pouts, trying to bury his face back into Harry’s pillow, hiding a smile as he turns away. Harry lives for that smile – that Louis only brings out for him – crinkles fanning out from around his eyes, like whispered brushstrokes of paint on a canvas.

“Say it again,” Harry prods, as he pushes up Louis’ shirt to get at more of his skin.

“About you being a morning person?”

“About loving me,” Harry sniffs, voice muffled as he kisses a line down Louis’ breastbone to his bellybutton.

“You’re an absolute menace,” Louis grumbles, sentence breaking off into a breathy moan as Harry sucks a love-bite into his hipbone.

“f*ck,” Louis’ hips buck up involuntarily as Harry mouths over hardness through the thick material of his gray sweats. Harry’s trying to untangle the drawstring as seductively as he can manage without taking his eyes off Louis when panic flashes in Louis’ blue eyes. He braces his hands on Harry’s shoulders, pushing at him.

“Harry. Stop.”

“Please, I want to suck you-” Harry pants, voice rough with a vein of lust. Since they started dating, they’ve gotten off with each other a few times – slow, lazy rutting through their clothes in Louis’ narrow bed and once in the stacks at the back of the library – but nothing like the blow j*b Louis had given Harry the night of the party. Not that he’s complaining. Harry’s more than happy with whatever Louis is willing to give him – having had no experience with this stuff himself – but sometimes he feels so overwhelmed with desire that nothing seems like enough. He wants to kiss and suck every inch of Louis’ skin, wants to crawl inside him and while away the winter.

Louis sits up suddenly, drawing his legs to his chest so quickly he nearly knees Harry in the chin.

“Just leave it,” Louis snaps when Harry reaches for him, irritation in his voice as he uses his open palm to push Harry away. Harry’s face flames with embarrassment and shame. Why does he feel guilty for wanting Louis the way he does? It’s bad enough that Harry has no idea what he’s doing, but Louis only makes it worse by acting like he’s doing the wrong thing all the time. It’s gotten so he can’t even reach for Louis’ flies without Louis flinching away.

Harry keeps his eyes trained on the bedspread like a chastised dog who’s just gone and weed on the carpet, gone still at the stern tone of Louis’ voice. He only belatedly realizes – with a shock - that he’s waiting for Louis to hit him. The thought makes his blood run cold. He trusts Louis and knows the boy would never hurt him, but after so many years of conditioning with his dad he’s always convinced he’s going to punished for any minor transgression, whether it’s warranted or not.

“I know I’ve never done it before, but maybe you can help me? I just want to make you feel good,” Harry mumbles softly, trying to keep the tremble out of his voice. Why does Louis have to make him feel so stupid? Harry’s perfectly good at doing that on his own.

“I’m going to take a shower,” Louis mutters, crawling out from under the cage of Harry’s arms, leaving him cold and confused on the bed. Harry hooks his hands around his elbows and rocks back and forth a few times, fighting tears, and wondering where he went wrong.

He’s been so happy the past two weeks he didn’t question Louis wanting to take it slow. It wasn’t like he was an expert on this stuff and he mostly took Louis’ lead in bed, which was fine with him. It was enough that Louis loved him; everything else was just an added bonus. But still, every time they were getting intimate - Louis always pushed Harry away at the last second - even when he was obviously turned on. After turning Harry down, Louis would escape to the loo to take a long shower, not returning until he was sure Harry was asleep. Harry could only imagine Louis was getting himself off in there, while he laid alone in bed staring up at the ceiling, frustrated and unsatisfied. What was wrong with him?

Harry wanted to ask Zayn, who’d had a relationship with Louis previously, but it was too private and mortifying and he didn’t want to betray Louis’ confidence. He’d racked his brains all week, but he couldn’t make sense of it. Was Louis worried he was too small? He’d mentioned how big Harry was the first time he saw him; did he feel inadequate somehow? Or did he have a problem getting and staying hard as the row he’d overheard Louis having with Eleanor would suggest? Or worse, unthinkably, was Louis not attracted to him? Harry recalled the awful night he had overheard Louis having sex with Eleanor through the wall and the brazen way he had fingered her in the carpark the night of the footie game. Louis was obviously a sexual creature, so why was he so averse to doing those things with Harry? Did Harry – did his scars – disgust Louis’ somehow?

They’d loved each other for years before Louis’ confession, but what if love wasn’t enough? What if it didn’t extend to attraction? What if it was one-sided and Louis was just afraid to tell him? What if he wasn’t really gay? The longer Harry thought about it, the worse he felt.

Maybe…maybe if Harry just slipped into the shower with Louis - maybe if he showed Louis he didn’t care what he looked like, that he would love him no matter what - maybe everything would be all right.

The loo is hot and foggy with steam when Harry slips in, undressing as quietly as possible. His hands are shaking as he pulls the curtain aside and steps in. Louis’ head is down under the stream, standing very still in the shower spray. His back is to Harry, water droplets rolling down his shoulders, catching in the elegant dip of his spine before streaming over the succulent curve of his arse. Tentatively, Harry slips his arms around Louis’ waist from behind, hooking his chin over Louis’ shoulder. “Hey. Thought you might be lonely in here.”

Louis jolts, as if electrocuted, turning to glare at Harry with such rage in his eyes, Harry nearly slips in his haste to scramble backwards. He doesn’t mean to, but his eyes naturally fall down the line of Louis' body. He’s not hard anymore, but Harry realizes too late why Louis kept him out, and despite the heat of the shower steam, he feels cold, all the blood draining out of his face.

“How? Who?” Harry stammers in shock, eyes widening.

“Get out,” Louis hisses, shoving Harry so hard his back collides with a loud smack against the tile, shoulder blades singing with pain. “Get the f*ck out.”

Harry leaps out of the shower like a scalded cat, blindly grabbing a towel off the rack on his way out. Back in his room, he sits down on the edge of his bed, still soaking wet, towel sloppily tied around his waist, mind reeling. It’s not so much what he saw as it was the way Louis lashed out at him, as wild and unpredictable as a cornered animal. It was the way Harry’s dad had looked at him, when Harry came upon him drunk and sprawled at the bottom of the staircase, reaching out for him, reaching for somewhere to slap or pinch.

The crying comes on like a sudden thunder-shower, brief and frightening in its intensity, tears pouring down Harry’s face as he gasps and chokes, taking fast gulps of his inhaler that leave him lightheaded but ultimately still breathless. He doesn’t even hear Louis come back in the room and when arms close around him from behind, he jolts like a netted fish in Louis' embrace.

“Harry, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Louis whispers, pressing soothingkissing in Harry’s hair. The heat of Louis’ skin and the familiar scent of his body wash makes Harry cry even harder. It takes several minutes to come down again and when he does, Louis is holding him tightly enough to bruise, like he's trying to keep all Harry's bones together. “I’m sorry.”

“’S my fault,” Harry hiccups. “I shouldn’t have surprised you. I thought – ‘S my fault,” he repeats miserably, scrubbing at his face with a corner of his pillowcase.

“No. You didn’t do anything wrong. I shouldn’t have pushed you. I just – I was scared, okay? I was scared you would hate me.”

Harry rolls over so he can face Louis and is startled to see Louis is crying too. “I could never hate you,” Harry says, horrified that Louis could think so even for a second.

Louis bites his lip, smoothing Harry’s wet curls back from his forehead. “That night when I asked you about your scars – it was because – because I thought you were like me. I wanted to tell you, but then you told me about your dad and sh*t, Harry, he really hurt you. And I did this to myself. And I thought if you saw, you would hate me.”

“Why…why did you do it?” Harry asks in a trembling voice. It’s impossible to reconcile the scarred boy he saw in the shower with the bright, happy boy he knows and loves. How could Louis keep such a thing from him? How did he hide it so well, not just from Harry, but from everyone?

“Eleanor was always picking on me for my weight and Stan was always going on about guys being fa*gs and poofs and I – I hated myself so much – I thought there was something wrong with me. I was punishing myself.”

“When was the last time?” Harry asks, unable to bear the thought that Louis has been doing this while they were dating, that he completely misread the signs.

Louis buries his face into Harry’s shoulder, voice thick with shame, words muffled into Harry’s throat. “The night I told you Eleanor was pregnant. I cut myself and then you came in my room and I freaked. You stayed and we talked, but the whole time, I was trying to keep you from seeing the blood.”

Harry remembers coming into Louis’ room after hearing them fight, remembers coming upon the small, crumpled figure wedged against the wall by the bed. Louis was shirtless, wearing a pair of basketball shorts, head wedged between his knees as his shoulders shook with sobs. Harry had just assumed –

Go away, Harry –

No – I know it’s not my place and that – I don’t really understand everything that’s going on between you two – but why do you let her treat you like that?

No, you really don’t understand-

So tell me—

Harry had just assumed Louis was crying because of his fight with Eleanor, and then after Louis told him, because of the pregnancy. At the time, he’d been too concerned with his own hurt feelings to examine Louis’. He remembered Louis limping down to dinner after his shower, putting on a brave smile for his sisters and wincing when he thought Harry wasn’t looking. But he’d chalked it up to Louis’ knee injury. He hadn’t suspected. He hadn’t even thought…how could he of?

“Will you show me?” he asks softly. Louis’ lips flatten into a thin line as he slowly peels his towel back, tears skidding quickly and quietly down his flushed cheeks. There’s at least thirty scars criss-crossing his thighs, high enough that no casual observer would see them when he wore a pair of shorts - varying in thickness and ranging from angry pink to faded white. In the harsh day light of Harry’s room, they look even worse than they did in the shower.

Before he can think about what he’s doing, Harry leans down, face still wet with tears, wet clumped lashes brushing the sensitive skin of Louis’ thighs so goose-bumps erupt on his skin. Softly, softly he ghosts his mouth over the scars, like a braille pattern he’s trying to read with his lips. He’s trying to understand it. He’s trying to let Louis know that it’s okay – that he’s okay – that Harry would never judge him or think less of him. Louis is shaking beneath him, coming apart beneath his kisses and when Harry crawls up his body at last, to plant a kiss on Louis’ lips, Louis clings to him like they’re free-falling through empty air.

“Please promise me you’ll never do that again,” Harry pleads, between increasingly fervent kisses.

“I promise,” Louis cries, surging up into Harry’s mouth, tasting of the combined salt of their tears and the gritty mint of toothpaste.

Harry gives Louis his first blowj*b that night and after, they spoon naked, bodies loose and sated. The scars on the front of Louis’ thighs line up with the scars on the back of Harry’s, slotting together like the black and white keys of a piano. Harry whispers into the darkness so quietly he’s not sure Louis heard until he hears his sharp, corresponding exhale.

“I don’t mind that you have scars. We fit this way.”

***

Harry finds Louis’ razorblades on accident one day – when he’s looking for a spare inhaler – at the bottom of the box of Harry’s stuff Louis has saved over the years. Harry’s shocked to find his name written across the metal sides of the razors in green Sharpie, but grateful that they don’t look as if they’ve been used recently. Louis catches him, standing in the doorway in an oversized jumper of Harry's, holding a cup of tea and looking faintly embarrassed. “I thought if I saw your name on them, it would stop me from wanting to – you know—” he explains.

“And does it?” Harry asks, hastily putting everything back into Louis’ shoebox. They have no secrets now, but he still wants to allow Louis some privacy when he needs it.

“Yeah. So far,” Louis smiles, walking over to sit on Harry’s lap. Harry marvels at how tiny Louis is – how his arms can encompass Louis’ entire body and wrap back around himself – as if he’s holding on to nothing. Louis lets out a tiny huff of breath as Harry kisses his neck. “It helps that I hate myself a lot less these days,” he says.

***

Winter formal comes upon them all quickly, on the heels of the first frost of the year. The weather report predicted snowfall for that evening and Harry worries he’ll be cold in the outfit he picked out with Louis. He has to admit; Louis’ idea was genius, but he’s still a bit scared of how everything will pan out, on top of his usual nerves because it’s his first actual dance and he’s going with Louis Tomlinson.

An hour before, Harry’s vibrating with nervousness and he startles, nearly falling out of his chair, when a text from Louis pops up on his mobile, as if Louis instinctively knew Harry was stressing out. Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be fine.

Thanks. I look ridiculous, Harry types, catching sight of himself in the mirror over his dresser.

Will you come over to mine a couple of minutes early? My mum wants to take pictures.

Harry can practically hear Louis rolling his eyes. ‘Course.

True to Louis’ word, his mum takes about a hundred pictures of them in varying poses – ranged on the steps, sitting by the fireplace trying to look casual, gazing into each other’s eyes, pinning the boutineers on each other (Harry’s a white winter rose and Louis’ a delicate pink and white orchid) – it’s all horrifically embarrassing. Especially when Harry’s mum decides to join in on the humiliation, busting out her own camera. They’re both beside themselves with relief when the limo pulls up out front (twenty minutes late) and they can finally escape, with only a few hurried lipstick smudges on their faces.

Louis gives Harry’s hand a reassuring squeeze before they step out. “You ready for this?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Harry grins.

“I love you,” Louis says, but Harry’s answering reply is lost in their joined lips.

***

After taking pictures in the photo booth, they make their way through the crowd and find Liam and Zayn lingering by the punch bowl, Liam’s arm firmly clamped around Zayn’s slender waist. Zayn looks radiant – in a hand-sewn sari of deep purple, with jeweled gold accents – that makes the burnt caramel color of his skin look even more flawless than usual. His eyes are lined in dark kohl, a gold sequined bindi across his brow and a thin patina of red on his lips. Harry’s sure that quite a few boys will be questioning their sexuality tonight.

Of course, they’ve not even been there a moment before Zayn undermines the illusion of feminine delicacy by punching Louis hard on the arm. “Was this your idea?”

Louis shrugs, smirking as he rubs at his bicep. “Maybe.”

“Twat,” Zayn says, closely followed by a whispered, “thanks.”

“You look beautiful,” Harry says, leaning forward to examine the gold accents on Zayn’s sari.

“You should maybe stick to suits,” Zayn teases, eyes roving over the dark green satin of Harry’s dress, the low collar offset to display his collarbones. Harry’s mum had tried to push jewelry on him – but he felt silly enough as it was – and they’d compromised on a tiny diamond and emerald pendant leftover from his grandmother’s estate.

You look better in it than that old cow ever did, his mother confided in him as she fastened it, smiling when their eyes met in the mirror.

Harry knows he looks ridiculous, but looking around, he doesn’t feel so alone. Somehow, Louis talked the entire footie team into wearing dresses to the formal, convincing them that it was the perfect prank, and even more blokes yet had jumped on the bandwagon when they heard. Harry forgets sometimes just how much influence Louis has. Hardly anyone notices Zayn among the sea of guys in dresses. Liam looks distinctly uncomfortable in his long white gown, constantly tugging at it, but he can’t seem to keep his eyes off Zayn, who shines under his attention. Niall, up in the DJ booth, keeps adjusting himself through his short red dress, ruining any element of feminine mystique he might have had going. It looks like a drag convention gone wrong, but Harry’s fairly sure he's never been happier.

“Come on,” Louis says, grabbing Harry’s arm. “Let’s dance.”

The gym is dimly lit for the occasion, the rafters strung with fairy lights and paper snowflakes, but it still smells faintly of sweaty gym socks and floor polish. There’s something faintly charming and unassuming about it though. The dance floor is already packed, which Harry is grateful for as it keeps everyone from staring at his awkwardly flailing limbs. Harry’s a rubbish dancer, all elbows and knees bumping and jostling Louis, who’s grinding against Harry so filthily Harry has to finally force some space between their bodies lest things come up. (There’s no hope of hiding anything in his skin-tight dress.) Louis smirks, his pale blue dress making his eyes look even more painfully, beautifully blue. “All right, bb?” he teases, drawing out the old nickname.

“Twat,” Harry grins, leaning forward to kiss the smirk off Louis’ face.

Harry notices Stan sulking and glaring at them from beside the punch bowl, looking distinctly uncomfortable as one of the only guys in a suit, but even that isn’t enough to bring Harry down. Niall’s upbeat playlist has them dancing for a solid hour before Ed takes the stage for an acoustic set and Harry drags Louis off to get more punch.

The gym is stuffy and they’re both flushed andsweaty from dancing, so after gulping down two glasses of punch, Harry pulls Louis out into the walled-in courtyard for air. There’s already a few couples out there, milling about and snogging in discreet pools of shadow thrown by the building, but they’re at enough of a distance that Harry doesn’t feel conscious about resting his head on Louis’ shoulder. They’re not dancing, so much as swaying in place, the music drifting out onto the parapet as the first snow-flakes of winter dust their hair and shoulders.

Harry gazes up at the night sky, ajeweled net ofstars cast out over a dark ocean, the swirling snow reminding him of the falling stars the night he and Louis had kissed on the hood of his car. Louis brushes Harry's cheek with cold-fingertips, bringing him back to himself.

“You know, Ireally shouldthank Liam Payne for running over your cat,” Louis says dreamily, breath hot against Harry’s ear.

“You’re incorrigible,” Harry crows, pulling away from Louis, only for Louis to pull him back in closer, leaving no space between their pressed chests.

“I was going to say because it brought you to me,” Louis amends, nipping Harry's ear. Harry lets out a hiss of breath.

“Poor Dusty,” he sighs. “Just another hapless victim on the road to love.”

Louis’ arms tighten on Harry’s waist, cold nose pressed into the depression at the base of Harry’s throat. “Thanks for waiting for me. To figure myself out. It can't have been easy,” he says softly.

“I’d have waited even longer,” Harry admits, kissing Louis’ temple. “For you.”

“Sop,” Louis bats at his chest. Harry shivers as a breeze blows a gust of falling snow over them, chilling his bare arms. “Come on, then,” Louis tugs his wrist. “I want to see Stan’s face when they crown Liam King.”

“Why are you so sure it’s going to be Liam?” Harry asks, raising an eyebrow as Louis draws him back inside.

“He’s won three years in a row. Really just a formality at this point,” Louis shrugs.

Harry grins wickedly. “Well, maybe it’s time to stage a mutiny.”

***

“If everyone could just settle down please,” Ed says, tapping the microphone a few times until a hush falls over the crowd. “It’s time to announce our Winter King and Queen.”

Amy runs on stage, slightly out of breath, carrying a ballot box under one arm and handing Ed an envelope with her free hand. “The results have been tallied. It was a very close race this year. I’m sure you’re all very eager to get back to your dirty dancing,” he smirks, looking pointedly at Harry and Louis. “So I’ll make this quick.”

Harry squeezes Louis’ forearm in anticipation, bouncing on his heels. It’s the first dance he’s been to and it’s all very exciting. He doesn’t care that he wasn’t nominated (nor did he expect to be); he’s just happy to be there and with Louis. “Your Winter Formal King is –” Ed opens the envelopes and holds a long dramatic pause as his eyes pan over the crowd, before he bellows into the microphone, “Louis Tomlinson.”

Harry turns to Louis, stunned, just as Louis knuckles him hard in the arm. “Ow, what was that for?” Harry asks, rubbing the sore spot.

“Stage a mutiny, he says,” Louis repeats in a mocking voice. “Did you have something to do with this?”

Harry holds up his hands defensively, shaking his head. “No. I swear. It’s all you.” Realization dawns slowly on Louis and his face breaks into an immutable grin.

“Go on,” Harry pushes Louis toward the stage, smiling just as widely as Louis is. “Go regale your adoring public.”

Harry’s heart catches in his throat when Louis’ shoe snags on his dress halfway up the stairs – he would have fallen face-first onto the stage were itnot for Liam Payne rushing forward to steady him by the elbow. Louis blushes,but rights himself with grace, walking tall and straight-backed the rest of the way to Ed.

Ed sets the crown on Louis’ head to the cheers of everyone and hands Louis the microphone. “Totally pulled a Jennifer Lawrence back there,” Louis chuckles breathily into the mic, to the answeringlaughter of the crowd. “I uh, I didn’t really have an acceptance speech prepared.” He pats down the front of his dress. “Nor do I have pockets to put one in so I guess it’s just as well.”

Louis takes a big breath, eyes scanning the audience. “I’d like to say I’m happy to be your first gay Winter Formal King, but as usual, I think Liam Payne beat me to the punch.” Harry chances a quick glance at Liam, who’s gone beet red, looking even more like a tomato against his white dress. “He tends to beat me to a lot of things actually. Kind of infuriating, really. We’ve been friends since we were kids and he was always just a little faster than me, a little smarter than me. And I consoled myself with the fact that I was better looking,” Louis says, pausing aminute for the laughter to quiet down.

“But in all seriousness, I’ve learned a lot from Liam. Like what it means to be a friend. And how to take my head out of my arse and see what’s standing right in front of me. And if Liam hadn’t been such a puss*-killer – I mean that in the most literal sense of the word – I’d never have had the courage to talk to my boyfriend Harry. Who, you know, beside this cheap drug store crown you’ve bestowed upon me is probably the best thing that’s ever happened to me. So yeah, thanks to Liam and to Zayn, who’s the best and bravest person I know and looks better in a dress than any of you suckers. And to uh, Harry. And my mum. And Jesus. And anyone else I forgot. Thanks.”

Ed pries the microphone from Louis’ hands. “Quite a heart-felt speech there from your King, Louis Tomlinson, but I know you’re all dying in anticipation to see who your Queen is. So without further ado – Amy – the envelope.” Amy hands Ed the second envelope and he clears his throat dramatically as he slides the slip of paper out.

“And your Winter Formal Queen is Zayn Malik!” The crowd immediately falls quiet and Ed drops the mic, letting out a loud, ear-splittingpeal of feedback that has everyone wincing. Ed recovers the mic as Amy rifles, panicked, through the slips of paper in the ballot box, looking presumably for an explanation. Zayn briefly looks as if he’s been slapped, but quickly composes himself as everyone turns to stare at him. With both hands, he cups Liam’s face and plants a loud smacking kiss on his mouth that echoes through the silent gym, before ascending the staircase much more gracefully than Louis had.

Ed, completely flustered, forgets to hand Zayn the microphone, so Zayn eases it gently from his hands as Amy secures the crown on his head.

“Not sure if this is someone’s idea of a joke, but if it is, they can feel free to suck my co*ck. And my balls, which are probably bigger than any of yours. You may have noticed some blokes tonight wearing dresses. Now, I don’t know what anyone’s told you, but it didn’t come about as some prank. It happened because my really, really wonderful and kind mates knew I would be wearing a dress tonight and they didn’t want me to be alone. And while their intentions were pure, the truth is, I like wearing dresses and I’m not going to apologize for that. And you know if that opens me up to anyone’s ridicule, I don’t much care. Because I’ve got the best mates anyone could ask for. And I’m f*cking the footie captain. So I don’t know if this started as a joke, but I’m honored to stand beside my mate Louis, who deserves this more than any of you twats. So thanks and f*ck you.”

The gym is dead silent as Zayn hands the microphone to Ed, who fumbles it back into the stand. “Uh, thanks to Zayn for that impassioned speech,” Ed mumbles, face red as his hair as the chaperoning teachers scramble to get things under control again. “And now your lovely King and Queen will have their first dance. Niall, if you’d do the honors.”

Niall grins and a snippet of Aerosmith’s ‘Dude Looks like a Lady’ pipes through the speakers, startlingly loud. Within seconds, Harry and Louis and a good deal of the dance floor are choking with laughter and Liam’s face is as white as a sheet.

“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Liam says, wobbling slightly on his feet. Harry reaches out a hand to steady him, while still gripping his side, which is starting to ache from laughing so hard.

“Oops, dunno how that got on there,” Niall smirks, before the opening bars of the Beach Boys ‘Wouldn’t it Be Nice?’ begin to play.

Wouldn't it be nice if we were older then we wouldn't have to wait so long? And wouldn't it be nice to live together in the kind of world where we belong…

A spotlight falls on the floor and a circle widens around Zayn and Louis, who do the most dignified slow-dance they can manage under the circ*mstances. Eventually, the laughter quiets down and Zayn lays his head on Louis’ shoulder. Louis lightly grips Zayn's waist as they spin in slow circles around the cleared dance floor. At the back of the gym, Harry sees Stan stomp out in a fury, and he has a pretty good idea who stuffed the ballot box.

Liam still looks as if he’s going to faint as Harry grabs his elbow and steers him onto the floor. “Oh come on. Dance with me, Liam.”

Other couples are starting to file in now, filling up the space around the King and Queen and Harry and Liam take their rightful place among them. As they’re turning in a slow spin, Harry catches Louis’ eye over Zayn’s shoulder and shares a tiny, secretive smile with himthat makes his heart skip a beat.

When the song ends, Liam cuts in, whisking Zayn away from Louis. Ed’s got his guitar back out and there’s a few beats of silence between songs, where Harry and Louis just stand there in the middle of the dance floor and stare into each other’s eyes. Harry thinks distantly that he’s found all the things he used to look for in books – romance and adventure and escape and excitement, but above all a home - and he's found it in Louis.

Ed’s voice comes softly over the microphone, breaking their trance. “I wrote this song for two of my best mates, who loved each other for years from afar before they worked up the courage to tell each other. It’s called Kiss Me.”

Settle down with me. Cover me up. Cuddle me in. Lie down with me
and hold me in your arms. And your heart's against my chest, your lips pressed to my neck. 
I'm falling for your eyes, but they don't know me yet. 
And with a feeling I’ll forget, I'm in love now. Kiss me like you wanna be loved… This feels like falling in love…We're falling in love

And f*ck, it’s like every corny romantic comedy Harry’s ever seen – the moment where two people realize this is it, this is real, this is something – John Cusack with a boombox standing under the girl’s window in Say Anything, the cute jock showing up at the church for Molly Ringwald in Sixteen Candles, Julia Robert’s confession in the book-store in Notting Hill, the little kid running through the airport after his crush in Love Actually.

Everything blurs to invisibility in the background so there’s only him and Louis, trapped in a bright prism of a spotlight. And then Louis is kissing him and kissing him and Harry feels like he might burn up his skin is so feverish and f*ck, when did this become his life?

They dance a few more songs and then stop for more punch, collapsing in a sweaty heap on some chairs against the back wall. Niall’s taken back over DJing and some bright, upbeat Euro-pop is playing, the crowd rolling up and down like a wave. Louis threads his fingers through Harry’s. “Do you want to get out of here?” he asks, the glint in his eye very clearly conveying his intentions. And it's not like it hasn't occured to Harry - that tonight might be the night - but it still makes him stomach fizz brightly as if he's drank too much champagne.

“Should we say goodbye to everyone?” Harry asks, searching the sea of faces for their friends.

“Nah, come on,” Louis tugs him. They call the limo and wait just inside the front doors for it to arrive. Harry stomach is fluttering madly. He can’t stop thinking that tonight is the night he’s going to lose his virginity. He's scared and nervous and he still hasn't figured out who's going to be on top, but he's also excited andready. Louis seems to be thinking the same thing, sucking a love-bite into Harry’s neck as he pushes himroughly up against the wall.

A voice very abruptly breaks through Harry's train of thoughts as Ed skids into the foyer from the carpark, hair wild, jacket open. “Oh Harry, thank God!”

“Is everything all right?” Harry startles, hands sliding from Louis’ shoulders. Ed’s eyes dart back and forth between the two of them, obviously coming to the realization he was interrupting something, but he plows on, unconcerned.

“It’s Gemma – she – I missed her text – I was playing – I didn’t have my mobile –”

“Whoa, slow down, mate,” Louis says, putting a gentlehand on Ed’s arm. “What’s going on?”

“Gemma’s in labor!” Ed blurts out. “Your mum’s taken her to hospital. But my car won’t start. Can you guys give me a lift?”

“Holy sh*t. Holy sh*t. Yeah of course,” Harry nods, his romantic evening with Louis completely forgotten. He’s going to be an uncle!

The limo pulls up right on time and they all scrabble in, leather seats squeaking under them as Ed leans up to give the driver directions. Harry pulls out the bottle of champagne he'd brought for he and Louis – he’d pictured drinking it under much more romantic circ*mstances but this will do– and pops the cork, golden bubbles fizzing out over his hand. He manages to fill three champagne flutes without spilling too much as the car bumps along downthe lane, Ed's foot tapping a nervous beat.

“Cheers!” Harry beams, clinking his glass against Ed's.

“Congratulations, dad,” Louis grins, clapping Ed heartily on the back.

Ed swallows hard, eyes big and wild. “Holy sh*t. I’m going to be a dad.”

“Drink up,” Louis says, tipping up the bottom of Ed’s glass as he drinks from it. “You’re going to need it.”

Most of the ride is spent calming Ed down – Louis rubbing his shoulders and delivering pep talks while Harry gives play-by-play updates from Gemma, who's texting from her hospital bed. “Six centimeters dilated,” he calls excitedly, as if he’s a sports announcer. Ed looks slightly green.

***

Ed rushes inside asLouis parks the car and a kindly, but confused receptionist (they’re still dressed in women’s formal wear) shows Harry and Louis to the waiting area. “You know, this isn’t exactly how I pictured this night going,” Louis smirks, stretching out across Harry's lap.

“Wearing a a woman’s dress in a hospital waiting room?” Harry laughs.

Louis snorts. “Yeah. But like…it’s all right ‘cause I’m with you,” he says, threading his fingers through Harry’s.

They spend a long, uncomfortable two hours on the hard benches in the waiting room, flipping through magazines and playing games on their mobiles. Louis’ mum stops by for her shift around One AM and brings them both a change of clothes and a few dollars for the vending machine and it’s much better after that.

Louis is nodding off against Harry’s shoulder when Harry’s mum finally emerges through the double-doors to the waiting room. “Would you like to come meet your niece?” she asks, smile eclipsing her face.

“It’s a girl?” Harry croaks, sitting up out of his slump. Louis jerks awake, nearly falling off the bench as Harry stands up.

Anne nods. “And she’s caused quite a stir already it seems. Sorry you had to leave your dance, love.”

“It’s okay,” Harry grabs Louis’ hand, pulling him to his feet. “Can we see her?”

“Come on. Right through here.”

They both stop to wash their hands in the large metal basin in the anteroom and then there’s Gemma, sitting up in bed looking exhausted, but happy, and Ed sitting on the windowsill next to her, holding her hand. And curled up on Gemma’s chest is the tiniest baby Harry’s ever seen, swaddled inthepink and whiteblanket Alma knitted for her, with a little white hat fitted on her head. Harry leans down and presses a kiss to Gemma’s sweaty forehead. “Good work, love.”

“You want to hold her?” Gemma beams.

“Can I?” Harry breathes, reverently stroking a finger down the baby's back. Harry sits down in one of the chairs beside the bed and Anne carries the baby over and shows Harry how to support her head and back. She’s sleeping so her eyes are closed, the lids powdery pink and slightly translucent. She’s got flushed, chubby cheeks and when Harry pulls off her hat, he finds a tiny tuft of red hair that he can’t resist stroking his fingers over. He marvels at how tiny her fingers and toes are, traces the bow of her tiny, perfect rosebud mouth over and over. He’s completely smitten.

“Have you decided on a name yet?”

“Imogen. After my mum,” Ed says.

“Ginny for short,” Gemma quickly adds, sharing a look with Ed.

“Hello there Ginny,” Harry coos, stroking her tiny seashell ear. When Harry looks up, Louis is staring at him with a strange look in his eye. It reminds him of the first day Louis saw him in the Tomlinson’s kitchen with one of the twins in his lap.

“Do you want to hold her?” he offers.

“Oh, uh, sure,” Louis shifts uncomfortably.

Harry passes Ginny off carefully and she makes a tiny contented sound as she settles into Louis’ arms. A second later her eyes flutter open and she’s waving her fist at his face. “Hello there, baby,” Louis smiles softly, tickling her chin. “We’re all so happy you’re here.” Ginny burbles a bubble of spit onto her onesie in response.

***

Harry’s mum gives them both a ride home, leaving Gemma and Ed and the baby to get some alone time together. Louis is worryingly quiet the whole way back to the house, staring out the window at the snow-covered fields.

When they’re finally in Harry’s room, Louis sits down on the edge of the bed, kicking off his shoes and staring at the carpet in silence. “What are you thinking about?” Harry asks carefully.

“I – uh,” Louis bites his lip, glancing away. “I don’t want to scare you off.”

“Impossible,” Harry protests, sliding his arms around Louis. “Now come on. You can tell me anything.”

“Back when I thought Eleanor was pregnant, I was really scared. Like really f*cking scared. I wasn’t ready and the situation was all wrong and when I found out it was a lie, I was just so,so relieved. But today, seeing you with Ginny, and seeing the way you are with my sisters…”

Louis glances up from his lap, meeting Harry’s eyes. “I know we’ve only been dating a few weeks…and I know it’s crazy, but I could…I could see doing that with you one day.”

Harry can't breathefor a moment he's so startled,butthen he smiles,lifting their twined hands up to his mouth to place a kiss on Louis’ knuckles. “Well, if you’re crazy, then I’m crazy too. Because I want that. With you. One day.”

“Good,” Louis says, resting his head on Harry’s shoulder with a sleepy, contented sigh. “Because I don’t plan on letting you go again.”

They're too tired to do anything but kiss lazily as they fall asleep, to the patter of snow on the roof, cloaking everything in stillness and silence, but Harry doesn't mind. They have all the time in the world. And his life's only just begun.