Unbelievers

Chapter 1.2

Louis doesn't even know how it happened. They were arguing on the football pitch, Coach yelling at them to stay after practice and talk it out, tired of their constant fighting. They did, and as expected it led nowhere.

They've always hated each other, is the thing. The first clash they had was when both of them wanted the same number on their jersey. Even though Louis had claim, Harry got it for some unbelievable reason. Louis had to watch his number, 17, get printed underneath a filthy "Styles" and he had to live by with the mortal and mere number 28.

Then there's the matter that Louis is the prime midfielder. He's the playmaker, ball distributer, and honestly the puppet master of the pitch. He runs the whole game, both defending and scoring, and without him his team would be nothing. He's practically the next Xavi Hernandez. It doesn't help, though, that Harry Styles is a striker – the best striker on the team, and Coach wants Louis to rather pass him the ball than score himself, and if Louis gets yelled at when he rather dribbles through the defenders himself than to do so, then that's something he's willing to take because no way in hell is Harry going to take the crown from Louis and win the scoring league.

It didn't get better when the seniors graduated, including the team captain, and Coach named Harry and Louis co-captains for their senior year. Louis was in rage. Dammit, he'd worked his arse off to be captain. All those nights at the pitch after school, all the hard training and morning runs – his coach should see that he's giving his all into this, considering if it doesn't involve a ball Louis despises working out.

It's early September now, and not even a month has passed since school started and Louis' been co-captain with Harry. It's unbearable is what it is. Harry's got the worst fucking ideas (starting up yoga with the team on Saturday mornings, really?) and the fact that he's the most pretentious jerk to roam this planet does not help. Stupid long legs, disproportionately broad shoulders, and how does one manage to have a six-pack while sporting love handles? Christ's sake! It's the granola, Louis swears on it.

Today, it was one of the usual fights.

"Why can't you get your head out of your fucking arse and pass me the ball for once, huh?" Harry growled, pushing through some of the teammates standing in the way.

"Oh, so you can miss the entire goal again? Like you did the last game?" Louis spat. It had been the last match of the previous season and they were down by one, in the final three minutes, and the bastard fucking missed the shot.

"Fuck you, Tomlinson. I was fucking tackled and you know it!"

"Stop blaming anything but yourself. You're just a pussy, aren't you?"

After that it escalated quite quickly. Now that he thinks about it, he's pretty glad Liam was there to rip Harry off his body before he punched him in the jaw. It's not fair to hit someone who's smaller and has a much prettier face, really.

Coach tried to speak with them, he really did, but after three years of hatred, verbal and physical combat, it's not that easy to just bury the hatchet. So when the boys were allowed to go back to take their showers, the rest of the team were already done and gone. Louis was fuming, throwing off his jersey on the floor in pure frustration. Harry wasn't better. The insults were showering down over both of them, and then Harry was gripping Louis' hips and they were getting off against each other on the floor. It was Harry's idea that Louis should fuck him. Louis' not really one to deny a free fuck, so.

Right now though, he's not sure why he would ever even consider doing something like that with Harry, the pretentious hipster moron that he is. Louis' not even gay to be honest. The only positivity he can think of right now is that they didn't kiss, so he didn't get any hipster bugs in his mouth at least.