tangled up in you ~ l.s

III.

"Louis," he says. "It's a frog."

The frog suddenly croaks, like it's trying to argue with Harry about its frog-ness. He loses, of course, because he is a frog. And because Harry knows these things, since Harry is a human and not a frog.

"His name is Harry," Louis corrects, haughtily. "Stop disrespecting him."

"You named him after me."

"All frogs are named after you," Louis replies matter-of-factly. "It's 'cause you look like all the frogs."

He's a complete nutjob. Harry resists the urge to smack him.

Harry decides to change tactics. Louis can be incredibly bullheaded about things like this, and he knows from experience that Louis can argue about a point for hours, for no other reason except that he 'just felt like it'. "Does this make me Harry number one, then?"

"No," Louis replies. He's still got his ears pressed to the glass of the cage, and he looks silly. "you're Harry number five."

"Five?"

"Yeah," Louis answers. "Prince Harry, Harry Potter, Harry Osbourne from Spiderman, Harry over here, and then you."

Harry crosses his arms. "Why does the frog that was named after me come before me?"

"He doesn't talk as much as you," Louis says dismissively.

Harry rolls his eyes, huffs, and wanders off, leaving Louis with Harry the fucking frog.

Eventually he finds himself at the rodent section of the store, watching, entranced, as a hedgehog burrows into the wood shavings of its cage. That's also where Louis finds him, however many minutes later. He takes one look at the hedgehog, before turning to face Harry, an eyebrow raised.

Harry keeps his eyes fixed on the animal. "You were right," he says, as the hedgehog curls into the little hole it made. It's really cute—small and quiet. It looks like it would make nice company. "Maybe I should get a pet."

"A hedgehog?" Louis asks. "Really?"

"What?" Harry asks defensively. "It's cute."

"It's boring," Louis replies. "How am I supposed to play with it?"

Harry gives him a look. "You don't," he says. "I'm not getting a pet for you to play with."

"What are you getting a pet for, then?"

"For myself," Harry says. "For me to take care of." He cocks his head at it. "Do you think I should name it Louis?"

Louis narrows his eyes. "You wouldn't dare."

"I'm gonna name it Louis," he says decisively, and tries not to laugh when Louis' face turns even more mutinous.

"You are not going to buy a pet hedgehog and name him after me, what the fuck."

Harry wasn't really planning on buying it, but now he kind of wants to. "Why not?" He challenges, raising an eyebrow.

"Because if you do, I'll cut off your balls and feed it to you in your sleep." Louis threatens.

Harry snickers. "You wouldn't."

"Try me."

—

Thirty minutes later, they leave the pet shop sans hedgehog, but with Harry's balls intact. Distantly, Harry knows that Louis wouldn't actually hurt him, but, well. Turns out Louis can be quite convincing.

Louis doesn't gloat, but he also doesn't stop smiling for the rest of the session.

-

Harry doesn't mean to slam the door when he gets home, but it still ends up banging noisily against the frame. He's not mad, per se, it's just—he's had a long, hard day, filled with long meetings about his planned music video, paparazzi getting all up in his face and shouting questions about whether or not he has his sights set on any girls, and reporters calling him up for statements about Kendall's new...whatever she's doing. He knows they're mostly syndicated—it is promo time, after all—but really, he just wants to go to sleep and maybe not deal with his life for the next eight hours or so.