Have I forgotten how to love; remind me once again

Chapter Seven

"You can be absolutely sure that I am going to reprimand you oh so severely later on - for not calling me earlier, so I could have been there for him. And for you! But I know how hard it must be for you right now, so it'll wait. And my love, as long as Harry is okay, everything is going to be alright. Just remember that."

The calm from her voice is replaced by a more frantic and slightly panicked tone, as she continues, worry probably still edged into her every fiber. "Now, for the love of god, give this phone to Harry so I can yell at him for getting himself hurt and get everything straightened out." Then, a little softer, "And then you're going to call me afterwards and we'll get this all talked through, love".

Louis laughs while wiping his cheeks dry and dapping uselessly at his eyes before he finds his way to the kitchen where the four other boys are indeed eating breakfast. He doesn't even try to hide his red eyes as he walks directly over to Harry, who is staring at him openmouthed with his spoon caught between his plate and his mouth, hands him the phone and says, "It's your mom."

Surprise turns to confusion, and Harry's hand sinks to the table, spoon landing safely on his plate, as he accepts the phone. "Why is my mom calling you?" Then, in the sudden heavy quiet of the room, Harry realizes, "Oh, right yeah, sorry. We were dating", he says awkwardly, then stands up too abruptly and holds the phone to his ear.

"Mom, hi! I'm sorry, my phone got crashed in the accident I'm sorry, mom, I'm so sorry..." is the last words they hear before Harry disappears upstairs to their shared bedroom, though Louis isn't even sure he can call it their room anymore.

He blankly refuses the hug Niall offers, instead gathering a sandwich with shaking hands and blurry eyes.

***

He did eat. Only about two bites though, and then Louis had found himself putting on shoes and a jacket, rushing out of the door without as much as a word to his rather worried friends. Crossing his finger's that they don't care enough to go after him - well, more likely that they acknowledge his need to be alone, Louis doesn't walk more than five minutes away from their home before he seats himself on an empty bench.

There aren't too many people here, and the few who are present, have all seen Louis before, so they leave him be as he draws one knee to his chest, the other kicking lightly at the pavement while his hands busy themselves with finding and lighting a cigarette.

The first inhale is like breathing freely again, and Louis realizes how stressed he's been since he woke up alone on the couch, still not certain whether or not he dreamt Harry's presence, but hoping desperately that he didn't.

God, he thinks, as he inhales again, when did his life get so complicated? Then he realizes that it always has been with the band, Simon, fans and everything else they've been juggling for years. And he isn't that great of a juggler, Louis thinks with a smile, that was always Harry's thing.

But despite everything being complicated, one thing was always a constant: Harry. And now he isn't. This isn't something a cigarette can fix, no matter how temporarily relaxing it is, but who knows, maybe two will do the trick, and Louis lights up another as he reminisces, despite knowing that neither of those two things will make him any happier.

They had fallen in love so quickly, awkwardness and teenagerly insecurities be damned. And then practically married since then, always together, always there for each other. Rarely ever do they fight, and even less often is it something serious - at worst it was a bit of banter or an ill-placed 'wanker', nothing that an apology and a bouquet of flowers couldn't fix. Maybe a blowjob if it was particularly bad.

They've always teased each other relentlessly though, as soon as they got over their initial awkward stages, and Louis vividly remembers the last time they were shopping at Target and Louis took the wrong brand of beans, Harry accusing him of choosing that one because he couldn't reach the correct one and Louis reacting with - what he assessed as - the correct amount of sass, whereas Harry didn't find it fair that Louis tripped him and called him 'a dangly giraffe who doesn't know what a normal person looks like' while flipping him off.