Would You Want Me?

Summer

Summer 🌼

The beginning of the school year is always the absolute worst for Harry. It's all figuring out where to sit at lunch and who you can trust in class to help out when you doze off during lectures. Harry thinks it's even worse this year because Louis won't be speaking to him for the unforeseen future.

Harry and Louis have been friends since they were young, only living a street apart for years. They played with toy trains and paper airplanes, they walked into their very first and very last day of primary school hand in hand, they asked each other embarrassing questions that left their cheeks tinted pint as they navigated puberty through middle school, they shared their first kiss together because they were too nervous to ask anyone else, they blurred the lines constantly between friendship and something more.

It finally reached something a little bit more when Harry realized he couldn't give himself to anyone he tried to be with. He wanted it to be Louis, he needed it to be Louis, but he didn't know if he felt the same way until one night after winter formal when Harry and Louis sat in Harry's mum's car eating soggy chips and parked at their secret spot they had found when they were young.

Harry had asked Louis if he's ever 'done it before' in his very graceful and elegant way and Louis had bashfully admitted that he had not. Harry didn't ask him what he really wanted to ask; would you want to... with me? He didn't have to ask because Louis knew, always knew what he was thinking, what he wanted, what he needed from him.

So, Louis turned to him and kissed him. It was different than it was the first time all those years ago. It was needy and hot, and Harry was embarrassed that he felt like he couldn't breathe without it. Like if Louis pulled away, Harry's soul would be pulled straight from his lungs. Louis made all the moves, Harry being too nervous to do anything that would make Louis stop kissing him, stop touching him, stop making all the sounds he was making.

It was everything Harry wanted it to be, and it was everything that Louis had thought that it would be. Not that he would ever tell Harry how much he'd thought about his best mate in that way. That would just cross a line with them. A line that gets blurred more and more.

They didn't tell anyone about their night together, but their mums talked very loudly and very frequently about the state they both came home in when the night was slowly turning to morning. Harry wonders if his mum knew, he didn't want to tell her that he thinks that maybe he likes boys. He definitely didn't want to tell her that he tried everything that they learned in health class that was meant to be with a girl, with a boy. With Louis.

His mum and Louis' mum found out anyways. Maybe they always knew there was something with Harry and Louis, something more than sleepovers and playing with toy trains. But neither of them said anything when Harry and Louis started to hold hands and cuddle on the couch watching movies on the weekends and kiss lightly when one had to go home. It never had to be a conversation and the boys had never been more thankful for their mums. For not having to explain themselves.

Their sisters never shut up about it, though, unfortunately. Whispers of 'what's it like?' and 'have you always been in love with him?' and Harry and Louis would just shush them sternly and tell them it was none of their business, but the girls saw the brush of pink crawling up their necks to the cheeks and took that as a good enough answer.

That is until Harry fucked it up. That's what Louis thinks anyway. Harry thinks it was Louis' fault. Does it really matter in the end, though?

So, now, Harry stares Louis down across the classroom. He knows Louis can feel it, his eyes burning into his skin, but he doesn't look up, he refuses to pay Harry any attention. Come on, Lou, look at me, please, Harry thinks it into existence. He's not ready for it when Louis turns just slightly to face Harry. His heart drops to his stomach when Louis looks up at him with big bright innocent blue eyes.