For an entire five days, Louis’ mother stayed firm in her insistence that Louis wasn’t allowed to leave the house – as short a time as that was, it still dragged for Louis; dragged like nails screeching down a blackboard at a painfully slow pace. Still, on the sixth day, she finally relented a little and gave her permission for Louis to leave the house the following day and go out with Liam, on the condition – which she failed to inform him of – that Liam wasn’t to let Louis out of his sight, and that he wasn’t allowed to let Louis go near anyone who Liam didn’t know, or was a mutual friend.
What she didn’t know, however, was that Liam relayed all of her instructions back to Louis and they spent the night before he was allowed out discussing plans to evade her demands in great detail. Liam didn’t appreciate being given orders and being told – not asked, told – to lie to his best friend and deceive him, snitching on him to his mother behind his back, and Louis didn’t appreciate being kept inside and told who he could and couldn’t spend time with like he was a five year old trying to play with the bigger boys and his parents thought they were a bad influence. United in their dislike of Jay’s orders and attitude, they fully intended to rebel against it, even Liam, who was usually so sensible and obedient.
Lying flat on his back, gazing at the ceiling, Louis held his phone closely to his ear as Liam said, “I don’t know, I don’t like lying, but at least when you ask me to lie, you ask me nicely. Your mother practically threatened me, spitting her orders down the phone…not to mention that it’s really out of order, stopping you from going out just because she doesn’t like some of your mates.”
“Tell me about it,” grumbled Louis. “Thank you though, Li. I mean it. You trust me – it means a lot more than you know…”
“I do trust you, but are you really sure about asking Harry to come and meet us? I mean, I get that he’s your mate, but if she let you off your punishment and you go out and immediately do the thing she was punishing you for, it’s tempting fate, isn’t it? Shouldn’t you leave it a couple more days before you go out again? She’ll go nuts if she finds out the first thing you did with your freedom was disobey her, not to mention the fact that she’d murder you both if she caught you within a ten foot radius of each other.”
“I don’t care,” Louis said promptly. “I need to see him.”
“I don’t understand, Lou. I’ll help you, but will you just explain something to me? Why does he mean so much to you? Whenever I’ve spoken to you these past few days, practically all you’ve talked about is how you can get to see him, or things he’s said, or whatever – it’s not that I mind, I just wish I could understand! He’s your friend, I know, but this seems different. He matters more to you than anyone else I know, and I can’t get my head around it. Why do you like him so much? What is it about him? Why is he special?”
“It’s difficult to explain,” Louis said carefully. “You remember what I was saying, about how I’ve been feeling different lately? He’s been helping me with that, helping me understand who I am and what I want to do, who I want to be. He’s so different from other people. For years he’s been shunned and hated and called names behind his back by cowards who daren’t say it to his face where he can defend himself, but he isn’t spiteful or bitter – at least, not unless he has cause to be. He’s got the most reasonable outlook on life of anyone I’ve ever known. He doesn’t try to force his opinions onto anyone, just states them and lets you make your own opinion of them, and he can explain them so easily that a baby could understand them – he taught me more about myself than I’ll ever know; when I finally stopped being ignorant and opened my ears to what he had to say, he sorted my head out more in twenty minutes than I could have in my whole life if I was on my own. He can make me laugh so easily I sometimes make myself jump by laughing unexpectedly. I’d trust him with anything. I suppose…the only way I can describe him is as my best friend.”
Jealousy seeped into Liam’s voice. “Your best friend?”
In spite of himself, Louis couldn’t help but smile at the blatant tinge of envy in his friend’s tone. “Not myvery best friend,” he promised. “That position’s taken.”
He could practically hear Liam’s grin down the phone; it felt like he could feel the warmth emanating off his friend’s face, pouring out of his smile and stroking Louis’ face like a wash of soothing heat.
“Okay,” Liam said, “I can see you guys are close…I’ll help you out. After all, I don’t want to be demoted to second-best-friend, do I?” If they’d been sat together, he would have nudged Louis playfully, but there was still the faintest worried edge to his voice.
“Like I ever would,” Louis said softly.
“I just worry, Lou. I don’t know what this guy’s like…I believe you when you say he’s been good for you; you’ve been a lot happier since you started hanging out with him, I’m just kind of scared to lose you, y’know? We’ve been friends for so long…I don’t want you to change so much that I don’t know who my best mate is any more.”
“I’ll always be me,” promised Louis. “Harry’s just helping me to stop being afraid to be me.”
“That’s what you need, I think. Confidence, more than anything. But don’t leave me behind, okay? I’m not always as sure of myself as I need to be either.”
Louis wanted to hug him. “I won’t. Don’t worry about that. Maybe Harry can give you some lessons on how to be who you actually are, too,” he teased.
Liam laughed. “Yeah, if I can manage to talk to him without running away.”
“He’s not at all scary when you get to know him, you know.”
“Mm. Maybe at some point I’ll get to find out for myself…” Liam mused.
Louis wasn’t exactly sure what he meant by that, but Liam had a specific tone of voice for when he had said something he had no intention of explaining – Louis liked to call it his ‘mysterious’ voice – and the chances of getting him to reveal what he was thinking when he’d said that were extremely unlikely, so Louis sighed, flopped back onto his bed and allowed Liam to change the subject.
~*~
Louis and Harry had agreed to meet at the entrance to what appeared to be a perfectly innocuous little alleyway. (Of course, Liam attributed the ever-present little smile on Louis’ face to the fact that he was going to see his friend again and had absolutely no idea that Louis was happily remembering the first time he’d ever felt the icy clink of Harry’s lip-ring against his teeth, run his hands through Harry’s hair, kissed him until they were both breathless.)
Louis was a little nervous as to what would happen once Harry arrived; it would be both rude and quite unkind to tell Liam to go away, but the very thought of the two of them standing side by side made his stomach ache with tension. He was indescribably anxious about having the two of them come face to face, and had no idea how he was going to tactfully make sure it didn’t end badly for either of them – he hated the thought of Harry leaving with the impression that Liam was just another judgemental churchgoer with no intention of opening his mind, and equally he hated the prospect of Liam leaving with the idea that Harry was an angry, vicious and terrifying person when all his intentions ever really involved was defending himself and his actions from other people’s scrutiny.
Liam was standing calmly with his hands in his pockets, apparently completely at ease. Louis wished he shared the sentiment. At a loss for something to do, he checked his phone out of what had become an increasingly frequent habit and discovered that he’d missed a text from Harry.
Be with you in 5 .xx
He’d sent it three minutes ago.
Biting his lip, Louis pushed it back into his pocket, feigning nonchalance that Liam probably saw right through; he knew him far too well. “Uh…Harry’s almost here, Liam. You don’t have to stick around. Any more. If you don’t want to.” He didn’t want to sound like he was trying to get rid of Liam, and his uncertainty made him feel uncomfortable; he stared at the ground and hoped he didn’t look guilty.
“Nah, that’s alright,” Liam said breezily. “I’ll stay here, if it’s all the same to you. I wanna meet him, Lou,” he said earnestly. “He’s your friend, and he’s clearly a part of your life now, so if I wanna stay a part of it too then I need to meet him, right? Don’t worry, I’m not going to say anything to upset him. I don’t have a death wish.” He grinned.
Nibbling his lip, Louis was beginning to wonder how he was going to break it to Harry that they had a third person tagging around after them and therefore they wouldn’t be able to be quite as free with each other as usual – something which would feel odd after so many weeks of the easy contact between them that had become more habitual than anything else; little reassuring skin-brushes and play-fights and quick, silly kisses, insignificant things that he knew would take a great deal of effort to restrain. But before he could dwell much on it, Liam’s eyes widened and he focused on something behind Louis; he didn’t have time to turn round before a pair of big, familiar hands grabbed his waist from behind, and a pair of familiar lips brushed against his ear, and a cheerful voice said “Hey, babe!” Then, he was being spun around, and Harry kissed him softly on the mouth, making the butterflies in his stomach flap wildly around, banging into the walls of his stomach so that they became dizzy and fell and started to drown in his stomach acid – at least, that was what it felt like. An insect massacre in his abdomen that made his stomach churn.
He melted into Harry’s embrace after only a few seconds, not exactly forgetting that Liam was stood behind them watching, but disregarding it – after all, he hadn’t seen Harry in six days, and every whispered phone conversation had been tense and filled with glances around him; flinches every time a floorboard creaked in case someone was eavesdropping. Every text had been sent, read, and deleted in an instant for fear that someone would get hold of his phone and demand to know why he was texting the most hated boy in town and putting kisses on the end. Harry’s hands slid down his back, smoothing out the knots of tension like creases on a sheet. The warm and icy contrast of his mouth and his lip piercing sent familiar tingles down his spine that shot all the way down to his toes like tiny little lightning bolts.
He could have stood there all day with Harry’s mouth moulding against his, his hands sliding down Louis’ back, curls tickling his forehead as he sighed contentedly and blew a cool breath into Louis’ mouth – but the back of his neck was prickling uncomfortably with the knowledge that Liam was staring at him, and he slid his hands between himself and Harry, gently pushing on the taller boy’s chest. With a soft pop, Harry’s lips came away from his and he looked curiously down at Louis, not upset, but confused.
“We, ah…we’ve got company, babe,” Louis said softly, and he turned and indicated Liam, who was stood watching them in silence.
“Ah,” said Harry, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand and looking a little bit sheepish.
He and Liam eyed each other apprehensively for a few moments, Harry looking a little defensive already, as if he was automatically expecting Liam to start shouting at him, and he had angled his body slightly in front of Louis’, as if he was trying to protect him. (That made Louis want to kiss him again, but harder.) Liam looked nervous, but not as if he was making judgements on this first impression – if anything, he looked to be lost in contemplation of some kind.
“I suppose I should have figured it out already, right?” he asked Louis. “It’s obvious enough now I’m looking at the two of you, I’m actually quite embarrassed that I didn’t manage to put together the pieces…” He held out his hand and gave Harry his usual warm smile. “I’m Liam.”
Harry looked a little taken aback, but he took Liam’s hand and shook it, and once he’d gotten over his initial surprise at being accepted so willingly, he returned Liam’s smile with a friendly grin of his own. “Harry. I suppose you’re going to say Louis’ told you all about me, right?”
“Actually, he’s said nowhere near enough, though it’s not for want of asking. Getting answers out of him should be some kind of impossible challenge; he won’t say a word, and I’ve tried enough times…has he told you much about me?”
“Nope. As far as I’m concerned, you’re an enigma,” Harry answered cheerfully.
“The same could be said about you.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Harry said, “Uh…I don’t want to be like, rude or anything, I’m just curious, but…Liam, you didn’t know that Louis was…” For a few moments, he struggled over trying to label Louis’ sexuality when Louis hadn’t even labelled it himself yet, then he settled for “with me. Like, with me. Did you?”
“No, I didn’t – which probably isn’t a great testament to my observational skills, but there you go.”
“It’s just, you don’t seem shocked at all. You go to church, don’t you? You go to Lou’s school. I kind of expected that you’d automatically hate me on sight anyway, let alone that you’d watch me and Louis kiss in front of you without so much as batting an eyelid. Aren’t you going to start lecturing us both about how wrong it is? Like…God’s will, or something? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you aren’t,” he hastily clarified, “but I just sort of expected that you would.”
Liam shrugged. “It’s Lou’s mouth; he can kiss who he wants with it. The way I see it, it’s his choice what he wants to do and it has nothing to do with me – I mean, if I had a girlfriend, and Louis disapproved of her because of her hair or something, I wouldn’t let him yell at me for going out with her just because she had a certain kind of haircut. So what right do I have to yell at him for going out with someone because they have a certain kind of genitalia?”
Harry’s mouth twitched with amusement at the analogy, then he was serious again. It was Louis who spoke next. “But…aren’t you worried about what God thinks of it?”
“I think if God was really that bothered, he’d have put an end to it by now, if I’m perfectly honest. If we as human beings have the inclination to have sex with someone, then God’s made us with that inclination; if he didn’t want us to have sex with certain people he’d make sure of it that we didn’t. Free will is there for a reason, Louis. Do what you want with whoever you want. Now, let’s go get coffee.”
Liam turned around and started walking down the street, heading off in the vague direction of the coffee shop they usually frequented, and they both stared after him as he wandered away. Once he was far enough away that he couldn’t overhear, Harry dipped his head to whisper in Louis’ ear.
“I like him. That guy has the right attitude. You’ve got yourself a good best mate there, Lou.”
“I have,” agreed Louis, then he turned around and smacked Harry on the arm. “Anyway, why on earth did you sneak up on me like that? My mother could have been breathing down my neck for all you knew!”
Harry snorted. “Yeah, like you’d bring your mother along on one of our dates. I’m not that clueless, Louis. I do have some concept of subtlety.”
“Yeah, and you spend most of your life demonstrating the exact opposite of it…” He slipped his little finger around Harry’s and gave him a little tug. “Come on, let’s catch up to him – his sense of direction is hopeless and he’s probably never gone to the coffee shop from this part of town. He’ll get lost if we’re not careful.
They started hurrying after Liam, pinkie fingers still linked in the most surreptitious handhold they were capable, and Louis couldn’t decide who was happier; Harry, whose smile was so big that it looked like it might leap off his face and fly away like a huge, toothy butterfly, or himself, so full of warmth that he was overflowing with it.
~*~
Everything was going so much more smoothly than Louis had ever expected – Liam and Harry were getting along like a house on fire. Usually, Harry could be a little withdrawn around other people (Louis suspected it was part of his natural defence mechanism that instinctively had him hiding himself from other people despite his insistence that he always wanted to be himself, just to protect himself a little from their heckles and scrutiny) but with Liam, he was his usual idiotic self, and Louis loved it.
They took it in turns throwing sugar cubes at him, which he tried to catch in his mouth, and actually succeeded a remarkable amount of times. Liam suddenly remembered to ask Louis about the Biology homework, which Louis had already done since he’d been on house arrest for a week, and Harry told them a story about how he hadn’t had Biology homework since he was in Year Nine, because the teacher was terrified of him and never asked him to hand it in for fear of what he’d do to her – something which Harry had been a little embarrassed about to start with, but now worked to his full advantage and managed to get Niall and Zayn excused from it as well.
Liam was determined to get to know Harry, and started asking him questions about his favourite colour, musical tastes, favourite films and TV shows, what food he liked, what he liked to eat when he was sick, his most liked and most disliked things about school, the books he enjoyed – the answers to most of which Louis chanted in his head like a little mantra before Harry had even had time to say them; he knew them all perfectly. (Favourite colour: black. Favourite bands: Motionless In White, Cancer Bats, Rise Against and Little Mix, of all things. Favourite film: Inception, although he had a secret fondness for chick flicks. Favourite food: spaghetti bolognaise, or apples. Favourite book: Lord of The Rings, or a series of fantasy novels Louis couldn’t remember the names of but remembered Harry excitedly showing to him one day.)
In return, Harry chatted away to Liam about things like school, favourite shops and preferred extra-curricular activities, whilst Louis happily sat back and listened to two of his favourite people in the world cheerfully talking to each other. It didn’t occur to him to be jealous – he was pleased that they were getting along so well; he hadn’t expected it.
Harry touched Louis’ back absentmindedly, at that was when Louis realized that Liam’s eyes were lingering on them every time they touched, taking in their interaction and how they acted around each other. He didn’t find that as strange as perhaps he ought to have – it didn’t strike him as strange. Rather than judgemental, Liam seemed curious, a lot like Niall was when he watched them, and with the same underlying fondness.
“I’m going to get a refill,” announced Harry, gesturing at his empty coffee cup. “You guys want anything? I’ll pay.”
He headed off to the counter, running a hand through his mop of curls, and as he went out of earshot Liam leaned over the table and said excitedly, “He’s great, Lou! I expected him to be – I don’t know, moody, or angry, but he’s funny and he’s great and – wow, Lou, just wow. You told me he wasn’t like everyone assumes, but I never expected this!”
With a proud smile, Louis agreed, “Oh, he is. He gets so much bad press, but he’s the sweetest person I know…”
“I always thought he’d be rude, and scary, and horrible, but he’s not…he has a sense of humour, one of his favourite bands is a girl band, he likes reading and he eats apples and he talks about his best friends like they’re the most important thing he has – he’s brilliant!”
“You don’t need to tell me that. I know it better than most. He’s my best friend, he’s helped me understand myself, I’d trust him with my life. We’ve played video games for three hours solid, watched girly movies and cried our eyes out together. I’ve told him my deepest darkest secrets and listened to his in return, I’ve – I’ve seen him stand completely naked in front of me with the Dark Mark on his arse and had him expose himself to me in every way he knows how. I don’t think there’s anyone else in the world who knows how brilliant he is more than me.”
“No, but Louis – if people knew about this, if your mother knew about this –”
“She’d feel exactly the same as she does now, if not worse. Liam, you know she’d go crazy about this even if she did know what Harry was really like, just because of his views, his sexuality, how he lives his life…it’d make no difference whatsoever.” Louis stared down into the dregs of his coffee, melancholy seeping into his previously jubilant mood.
“Maybe, but not everyone would. Your father might not mind so much, and your sisters…”
“My father might as well be a clone for all the independent thought he has, all the ideas he’s had for himself that he actually dares to say out loud since he married her. He parrots every word that comes out of my mother’s mouth, you know that. And my sisters wouldn’t dare speak out, except maybe Fizzy, and even if they did, what could they do? It’s no good. My mother would never accept this, and she’d never allow my family to accept this either. Harry’s one of the most important part of my life, and if I want to keep him, some day I’m going to have to cut myself off from the rest of it. I accepted that a while back – trust me, once you have too, you’ll stop worrying so much about what other people think of him. I have, he has…it’s better that way. Right now, I’m going to let this go as far as it can, until it runs both of us into the ground, and just hope that I’m strong enough to pick myself up again once we’ve crashed.”
Harry slid back into his seat, placing a tray with three fresh cups of coffee on the table. Instantly, Louis sat up and plastered on a smile, not wanting Harry to know just how much it hurt him that his family couldn’t accept the boy with the outlined eyes in the same way that any decent person with their judgement unclouded by prejudice would, and Harry returned his smile with one of his own, running his hand down Louis’ arm.
“Formulating a plan to get away from me?” he teased lightly.
“Actually, we were discussing whether chains or handcuffs would be a more effective method of making sure you never leave my side,” Louis countered.
“Ooh, kinky. Didn’t think you’d be into that,” Harry said, waggling his eyebrows suggestively at Liam.
Laughing, Liam raised his own eyebrows as he reached for his mug. “What can I say? I’m full of surprises.”
Pleased by his reaction, and the fact that Liam had easily joined in with the flirting just as readily as Niall and Zayn would have, Harry beamed at Louis and leaned in to kiss him on the cheek – at the last moment, he realized that they were in public and, blushing, he shifted the gesture into one more appropriate for company, into one that a pair of very close, touchy-feely friends could be allowed to get away with; he put his arm around Louis and rested his head on Louis’ shoulder.
Louis couldn’t help himself – he turned his head and whispered into Harry’s hair, “I love you.”
The little smile on Harry’s face grew, brilliant and blazing as if someone had jammed a lightbulb into his mouth and his teeth were all fairy-lights, lighting up his entire face, and Louis was once again reminded that he never wanted Harry to stop looking like that for the rest of their lives.
~*~
Liam had a Media Studies exam that he needed to revise for – a subject which Louis didn’t take – so he made his excuses and left not long after, leaving Harry and Louis to find some much-needed time to themselves. Rather than going all the way back across town to Harry’s house, though, they were happy to wander around town, standing very closely together and talking softly, exchanging words that were inaudible to any curious ears that happened to be eavesdropping. Not that anybody dared to do so. As they made their way through the streets, Louis began to notice something that he’d never really been aware of before, since Harry didn’t make a habit of visiting the busier parts of town before – now, in the midst of the more populated areas near to the town centre, it was painfully obvious.
Nobody wanted to be anywhere near them.
Mothers with children pulled their sons and daughters closer and crossed the street to avoid Harry. Groups of giggling teenage girls looked wary and bunched tighter together as he approached. Behind them, Louis could have sworn he heard catcalls and insults being yelled after them, unmistakeably malicious in tone although they were too far away to make out. He followed Harry’s example and didn’t turn around, but the back of his neck prickled and he couldn’t help feeling like a cornered animal, as if they might pounce from behind and throw him to the ground at any second. Harry held his head high, kept walking and ignored it all, but there was an unmistakeable tightness to his jaw.
In response, Louis walked a little closer to him, so that their sides pressed together, trying to communicate to Harry that despite other people’s instant dislike, their instant fear of him, he was still there. He was still by his side. People started shooting distrustful looks at Louis just because he had the audacity to stand next to this misfit; they looked at them and then looked away as if being a punk could just rub off on you like a disease, like they were both tainted and they could spread it if you looked at them for too long. He didn’t care for himself, but for Harry, he hurt. Because only now, after all this time, after examining Harry’s valiant don’t-care facade, the front he put up for himself, after trying to emulate it and becoming so intimately familiar with it, did he know that it really was just a front. Harry did care. He cared so much that it made Louis ache with the urge to comfort him. But when he opened his mouth to try and say something, Harry just gave him a look that quelled whatever he had been about to say; Harry didn’t want his pity. It wasn’t going to make anything better, if anything it would just punch another hole in his armour, and in public he was going to struggle to patch it up.
They called it a day eventually – Harry was starting to look a little bit miserable, twitching every time a shout came down the street regardless of whether it was directed at their backs or not, and Louis didn’t want to push his luck with his mother – she could well decide to enforce an unexpected curfew at the last minute that she wouldn’t tell him about but would still punish him for breaking. When they reached some of the quieter roads towards Louis’ house, they dared to hold hands, checking over their shoulders every few minutes or so, and Harry visibly relaxed.
As they headed towards Louis’ house, mentally preparing to separate, they stopped beside a lamp-post and Harry was slowly starting to lean in for the first of a whole host of goodnight kisses (they could never stop at one; it was always intended to be a fleeting peck that became at least five, none of them quick except for the last as they tore apart and Louis started jogging down the road to get away from him before his self-control failed him once again). They looked at each other in silence for a while, Louis feigning shyness because even though any inhibitions about kissing Harry had long since faded, Harry had admitted to secretly finding his initial timidity quite cute – but just as Harry’s mouth was coming into close proximity with Louis’, hovering a few inches away as he deliberately lingered to prolong the moment, Louis’ phone chose that moment to go off, making him jump.
He shrugged apologetically, veering away from Harry’s lips; if it was his mother, delaying several minutes to answer it would not be a good way to win her favour; it would only encourage her to start interrogating him, and if he and Harry started kissing then it really would be several minutes. He fished his phone out of his pocket to find, to his surprise, a text from Liam.
U home yet?
It had taken him aback so much that he tapped out a response without thinking.
No, why?
Liam’s response came back uncharacteristically quickly; Liam’s messages were usually typed out with painstaking slowness and riddled with spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, which perhaps attributed to Louis’ unease as he read the next text.
Watch urself.
Frowning, Louis looked at Harry as if the dark-haired boy could offer up some form of explanation for an ominous text that he hadn’t even read – but before he could show it to him, question Liam or even open his mouth, a piercing shriek rent the night, making them both flinch.
“Louis William Tomlinson!”
“Fuck,” Louis hissed, and he turned around and gave Harry a panicky shove. “Oh, heavens above, now we’re in trouble. Quick, before she sees you! Go on, get out of here –”
Jay appeared out of the darkness, running towards them, her hair dishevelled, wearing an apron with navy and white stripes, her face flushed. She looked absolutely livid, far more so than when she’d started screeching at Louis over his lip piercing: she looked ready to commit murder. Lurching out of the darkness, she grabbed Louis by the arm and gave him an enormous tug, making him stagger as she hauled him away from Harry by pure force.
“Get away from that boy! What on earth do you think you’re doing, associating with hooligans and blasphemers and gay people? What will the neighbours think? What will your father say? What will ourfather say?” she demanded, gesturing at the sky to indicate God. “I’m ashamed of you, Louis, associating with these sinners! I told you to stay away from those horrible punk boys!”
“I can explain –” Louis began desperately, although his mind was blank. He tried to struggle away from her, but she wouldn’t let go.
“Oh, I bet you can. Lying is a sin too, you know! Come inside, Louis, and if I hear one word of protest from you –”
“Whoa, hey, get your hands off him,” Harry said angrily, taking Louis’ other arm and gently tugging Louis towards him.
Appalled, Jay glared at him. “Don’t even talk to me! You’re a vile, evil boy and I won’t have you anywhere near my son! Don’t you talk to me, don’t you touch him! Don’t you come near my family!” She gave Louis such a vicious haul towards her that he yelled in pain, and something flashed in Harry’s eyes that made Louis’ stomach fold in on itself with worry. In that moment, Harry looked like he might hit the shouting woman in the face – and worst of all, Louis wasn’t entirely sure that he was inclined to stop him.
“I’m vile? Have you any idea how ridiculous that sounds, coming from you? You oppress your children; you talk down to everyone who’s a little different from you; you won’t even listen to other people’s opinion! You make your own son ashamed to be who he is!”
“If who he was wasn’t shameful, then he would have no reason to be ashamed,” she retorted, “now get away from my son and my family and don’t come near us again, or I’ll call the police!”
“Mum,” Louis said, and he couldn’t help himself – he started crying. Not because she was hurting him, even though she was, or because she was going to separate him and Harry, although that would have almost been enough – it was the look on Harry’s face, that disgusted, horrified look at the fact that she clearly completely believed in the horrible prejudice she was spouting. The fact that two people he loved clearly hated each other on sight, and even though he knew without a shadow of doubt that Harry was the one in the right, he still didn’t like to see him giving Jay the filthiest look he’d ever seen Harry give anyone in his life.
“Don’t be so pathetic, Louis,” she snarled, “come inside.”
“What are you going to call the police for? On what grounds are they going to arrest me?” demanded Harry. “Despite the way you act, there’s no crime in a couple of piercings or listening to metal music, or having some tattoos. There’s no crime in my sexuality, either.”
“No, but there is a crime for causing a disturbance, for assault, and heaps of other things besides which I’m sure any of the local churchgoing police force would love to have you arrested for – so take my advice and get. Out.”
There was a long pause, where Harry looked at her as if she was the most disgusting thing he’d ever seen in his life, his hand still resting on Louis’ arm despite Jay’s desperate efforts to drag him away; every time she gave him another pull, Harry merely stepped forwards, meaning that she couldn’t separate them without physically removing Harry’s hand, which she clearly didn’t quite dare to do. She glowered at him, and he stared back, one eyebrow raised, lip curled with revulsion – and more tears dribbled down Louis’ face, because despite what he’d said to Liam a small, desperately hopeful part of him had still hoped that there could be some kind of peaceful resolution to this, that if he could just get Harry and his mother to meet on civil terms then maybe they wouldn’t loathe each other on sight. Now that this frail hope was shattered, he couldn’t hold back his distress at how openly they hated each other.
Harry took a deep breath, then he looked at Louis. “Do you want me to go?” he asked quietly.
Louis closed his eyes, feeling several tears leak through his eyelashes, and he pressed his lips tightly together and nodded.
He heard Harry’s sharp intake of breath. He felt those long fingers drop from his arm. He heard the sound of Harry’s footsteps as he turned and walked away from them, slowly fading until he couldn’t hear the slightest sound – but he couldn’t bear to open his eyes and watch, because while they were still safely closed he could perhaps fool himself that Harry hadn’t really left.
Of course, his mother quickly shattered that illusion. “Come inside!” she snapped, yanking him backwards so that his eyes flew open in shock and he could clearly see that apart from the two of them, and a curious cat (probably one of Louis’) underneath a parked car with gleaming eyes, the street was empty.
He stopped struggling, then; allowed her to pull him inside, and he dropped exhaustedly into his usual seat at the kitchen table, all the fight going out of him. Once again, he closed his eyes, wondering if he could just fall asleep right there and then, and not wake up, because his dreams, at least, she couldn’t separate him from.
She dealt him a stinging slap to the back of the head, and Louis yelped and sat up immediately, his head throbbing. He wanted to glare at her, but he didn’t dare; he dropped his gaze back to the table and stayed quiet.
“I thought I’d made it clear that you weren’t to go anywhere near that boy or his horrible friends! You’ve lied to me, Louis. That’s clearly stated as a sin, even if you seem to think there are some grey areas. You’re grounded for the next month, no early release this time – and I’ve half a mind to stop you seeing Liam as well, since he clearly can’t be trusted any more than you can.”
Too exhausted to argue, Louis watched her begin pacing up and down in silence, but in his head was a relentless chorus of I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. This he was certain of now; he loved her, of course – she was his mother, despite how much he might wish the contrary – but oh, he hated her. His hatred burned, cooking him from the inside out with the effort of keeping it in. He was too tired to fight her, but at the same time he could have screamed at her for hours for the things she had done and the way she had treated Harry, the way she had separated the two of them. Hate was an emotion Louis was unfamiliar with; it filled his mouth with a sour, poisonous taste and sped his heart with a desire to act on it. But he stayed unmoving, silent, determined not to stoop to her level. Thus far, he and Harry were in the right – he didn’t want to change that.
“I was in town,” she said. “Walking through the square – and I saw you and Liam sat in the coffee shop, talking. I thought it was sweet. I stopped to watch, to see the difference in you, how much less surly you seemed around him than you have been these past few weeks. I thought he’d done you good. But thendo you know who walked over to your table?” Her breathing sped, cheeks flaring bright pink like someone had splattered poster paints across her face. “I saw that awful boy, and he came and sat down at your table, and he touched you. He put his arm around you, and you let that vile boy hug you, like – like you were friends. That was when I realized that as far as you were concerned, friends is exactly what you were.” Slamming her hands down on the table, she leaned across it, right in Louis’ face. “That boy is not your friend, Louis. He wants to lead you astray; to poison your mind and fill you with nasty ideas and get you into all sorts of trouble. He’s Hell-bound and no mistake, and he wants to drag you downstairs with him.”
Without comment, Louis dully watched her, almost amused by the sheer ridiculousness of what she was saying. His anger washed away the faint tinge of humour almost instantly, and he struggled to stay blank-faced and empty so that she wouldn’t see the rebellion in his face. Any display of independent thinking now, the slightest display that he was going to ignore her sermon, would only make things worse for him.
“Give me your phone.” She held out her hand.
He handed it over without complaint. He’d deleted every text to and from Harry; there would be no incriminating evidence on there. Likewise, every shady text from Liam had also been deleted. He didn’t trust his mother not to have gone through his phone long before this, and had no intention of leaving anything for her to find.
“I’ve disconnected the Wifi from your laptop, and if you reconnect it then you’re in trouble. I don’t want you talking to anyone. You’re not to make phone calls, or write letters, or anything like that. I’ll be keeping an eye on you. I didn’t want to have to treat you like a baby, Louis, but you’re on house arrest effective immediately – I’ll walk you to and from school every day to make sure you aren’t seeing this boy anywhere.”
Louis looked up, unable to contain himself any longer. “That’s ridiculous, and you know it is. How long exactly are you going to cut off all contact with the outside world and treat me like a four year old?”
“Like I said. A month at first. He’ll soon get bored once he realizes he can’t corrupt you anymore; a month will be all it takes for him to get fed up. We’ll see how you behave then. But Louis, if I see you anywhere near that boy again, regardless of who initiated the contact, I will be calling the police.” She left the room, already trying to make his phone work so she could read his texts.
Louis groaned and buried his face in his arms, his shoulders already shaking. A month? He knew Harry wouldn’t give up on him, there was no way that would happen – but he wasn’t sure whether his own sanity would survive a month with no extra-curricular contact with anyone other than his family. He was shaking all over at the prospect, filled with anger. How could she treat him like that, without even letting either of them?
Still, he’d made his decision now. If he was going to anger her, he might as well do it properly, might as well be well and truly disowned. He didn’t want to be a part of her dysfunctional family any longer. He no longer cared what they thought of him and how much of a disgrace he apparently was to them – in fact, it was now his aim to become as big a disgrace as possible. He’d bide his time, take his punishment and act as if it were a test to see if he and Harry could last through this degree of separation – and then as soon as he was free, he’d walk straight back into Harry’s arms.
The thought made him smile, if a little grimly.
Like Harry before him, all those years ago when he’d got his first cobweb tattoos, he’d just cut the strings.