Ready to Run

Chapter 10

When Louis wakes up, it is two hours later and Harry is still driving, tapping the melody of a song Louis can't recognize on the steering wheel. Louis stretches his arms in front of him and Harry turns to look at him, his face lighting up with a smile.

"Look who decided to join us." He teases before looking back at the road.

"Us?" Louis chuckles. "What is it, are there several people in there?" He asks, tapping Harry's temple twice.

"There are." Harry nods and Louis shakes his head, smiling. "Meet Tori, Charles, Eden, Anna and Angelina. They're all little people in my head." He says and Louis laughs at his silliness, secretly finding this extremely endearing, despite being a little weird.

"Why are most of them girls?" Louis asks curiously with a tilt of his head. Harry smiles.

"Ha. It's just the way it is and as long as they pay the rent..." He shrugs a shoulder and Louis cackles amusedly.

"Alright, then. Where are we going?" He asks because Harry has been driving but they did not even agree on a location before leaving.

"I didn't know where you would want to go but I was thinking about Colorado." Harry says.

"Oh? Why Colorado?" Louis asks curiously.

Harry shrugs and looks straight ahead. Louis sees that his shoulders tenses the slightest but it is still noticeable, at least it is for Louis. Harry seems a bit nervous and Louis can't really tell why, because his question was not invasive or anything, was it?

"I wanted to, um." He starts but shakes his head. "Nothing. Forget it."

Louis frowns, confused. "Hey, none of that. We're two on this trip so we can do something you want to do too, just tell me. As long as it's not killing someone or something equally bad, I'm in." Louis says and Harry chuckled lightly, his shoulders slumping.

"I wanted to go to Pride since, you know, or maybe you don't, but it's Pride month, and I read that the one in Denver is really great so I just wanted to see it myself." He rambles. "But we don't have to if you don't want to. I mean it's okay, I perfectly get it if-"

"H." Louis chuckles, endlessly endeared by Harry and his rambling -maybe also the way he blushes.

"Yeah?" Harry says, refusing to look Louis' way, not even a quick glance.

"Of course I want to." Louis replies.

"Okay." Harry sighs, seeming very relieved.

"Why were you nervous?" Louis asks him.

Harry shrugs. "I don't know, you could have been a homophobe?" He says.

"Harry, did you forget about Matt and my obsession over Taylor Swift?"

Harry huffs. "Because you like Taylor Swift doesn't mean you're gay." He says.

"In my case, it does." Louis tells him and Harry chuckles.

"Okay." He says. "How do you identify yourself, then?" He asks, this time glancing at Louis.

"Unlabeled or queer. Whatever." Louis shrugs. "Labels never were something I felt comfortable with."

When he was younger, Louis used to want to belong somewhere and find a way to describe how he felt. He struggled for a long time with his orientation and everyone kind of knew around him. He had a friend who was bisexual and another who was pansexual and both of them seemed happy with belonging somewhere, knowing there were people like us. But it was not this way for Louis.

For a long time, he had tried to find a label and be like someone he knew for him to feel accepted and 'normal' in a way. But he never felt comfortable with any of those. He desperately wanted to feel like he was part of the community and he did not know how if he did not put a name on who he was. But after some time, he realized that trying to put himself in a box was not doing any good for him and he finally found a 'label' he felt comfortable in. So from then, he identified as unlabeled or queer.