Oak St James

Chapter 5

So, on the Friday night, Harry bundled Louis and Niall (the latter a last minute invite – as Niall wanted to do his weekly shop and Harry thought why not kill two birds with one stone?) into his Range Rover and drove them into Kingsbridge to the supermarket. It was a mistake he wouldn’t make again – the two of his friends acting like complete kids who just wanted to play with the trolleys all the time and would quibble over everything from brands to who got to sit in the front seat. By the time they were ready to hit the checkout Harry was ready to enforce a Supernanny time-out. Instead of making them stand in a corner for one minute of every year of their age, though, he dragged Louis down to a much further away till from Niall. Funnily enough, Louis was immediately as nice as pie the second they were away from their friend and Harry couldn’t help but wonder if Lou had actually been annoyed with Niall interrupting what would have originally been a trip out for just the two of them. With that thought in mind, he dropped Niall off first – even though Louis’ house was arguably closer – and then invited Louis to his for a cup of ten, in a guise of reading over the recipes. Louis ended up staying past midnight as they got caught up playing cards and chatting about their favourite music. They were astonished to learn that they had actually gone to see The Script in concert on the same day and in the same venue. In fact, there was even a chance they might have walked past each other as their sections hadn’t been that far apart. Harry idly wondered if they had met that night, whether he would have flirted but then he remembered that Louis would have been with Stephen – oblivious to the lies and completely head over heels. That made him suddenly pause pensively – had nobody ever had an inkling of what Stephen had been truly feeling? Fourteen years was a long time to pretend without slipping up. Don’t get him wrong, Harry definitely sided with Louis over the whole affair but he could still understand the mentality of why Stephen did what he did. He didn’t know exactly what Louis had sacrificed – although he could take a good guess – but the guilt was obviously enough to make Stephen feel trapped into continuing the lie. Surely there must have been signs though that the sentiment didn’t quite ring true from both sides, or had Stephen really been that good an actor?

Harry supposed it didn’t matter in the end. While it was understandable that Stephen had felt pressured, what it really came down to was cowardice. Louis was always going to be hurt but the longer Stephen put off the inevitable the worse the hurt got. Stephen just hadn’t been brave enough to end it when he should have and that’s what made him the arsehole. Well that and leaving Louis to have a seizure alone, stealing someone else’s wife, encouraging her to run away with him and abandoning two young children in the wake. Sure, relationships sometimes ended unexpectedly but there were ways to sever ties that would soften the blow for everyone. How Stephen and Sarah (was it?) went about it, just up and leaving one night, was wrong on so many levels. Yeah, they were arseholes of the highest order and god forbid Harry from ever meeting them on a dark corner late at night.

~*~

At ten am the next morning, Louis shuffled back into Appletree House, sleepy eyed and bushy haired and only half-willing to get stuck in. By the time the three Parkin Cakes were cooling on the racks and the pastry was chilling in the fridge ready for the quiches the next day, Louis looked even more frazzled than when he’d arrived and was a lot less willing to ever bake again.

“You did very well,” Harry complimented him as Louis face-planted pathetically over the breakfast bar. “The dripped icing effect on that third cake is better than anything I’ve ever managed.”