green light ; larry

1- sober;

"i am so sick of you."

the words echoed back at him as he saw the bare figure in the mirror look back at him tiredly.

"i thought you could recover."

"i was never a quitter."

harry had long forgotten the shower he had come in to run before he was distracted by his own reflection and at that point, he figured he could go another day without showering. he tore his eyes away from the mirror and turned the water off, pulling his shirt back on. it was a defeated walk back to his room and he closed the door absentmindedly behind him.

"didn't you shower?" louis asked from harry's bed, putting his phone down. harry had almost forgotten that louis had been sitting in his room the entire time, and probably would have went through with the shower if he had remembered.

"yeah, i just," he rubbed his eye. "i dunno." harry recognized the flicker of hurt briefly make an appearance on louis's face, but it left as quickly as it came.

louis patted the spot next to him invitingly. "come lay down."

harry offered a small smile, turning off the lights and crawling into the space that louis had left for him. he stared at the ceiling, the glow-in-the-dark stars and planets seeming to create a little universe that orbited around him and the boy next to him. when louis had stepped foot into his room for the first time, that had been the first thing he commented on. "stars?" he had asked, curious. i put them up when i was six and have been too lazy to take them down ever since. half of that answer was a lie, and harry knew it then.

since he was young, he had always wanted to be an astronaut- the idea of floating throughout space, weightless, was what he had always dreamed of. weightless. floating through a nothingness that extended to the edges of forever. he imagined that louis's breathing was his own through a big helmet as he swam around a dark abyss, where there were no mirrors or scales or anything of earth.

"you're thinking about space again, aren't you?"

"yeah."

"someday."

"someday." he said the words like a confirmation. harry knew that he wasn't going to become an astronaut and louis knew that too, but space had become their metaphor for the love between them. two stars in something endless and terrifying but as long as they could feed off of each other's light, they were okay.

harry fell asleep to the stars twinkling above him and louis's astronaut breathing.