Louis noticed Isabella had finally fallen asleep and took a swig out of his beer bottle. He shouldn't be drinking at all considering he was at that age of earning himself a beer belly, but, fuck it, he was already stressed out beyond belief.
It hadn't even been a whole week of this whole commitment thing and Louis was already itching to get back to his regular life. Louis' ratty, old sofa and cheap wine had never sounded better than right now when he was supposed to be filling in someone else's shoes.
Louis wiped his wet mouth with the back of his hand and entered the living room to see Harry sitting cross-legged on the sofa. Harry was chewing on the eraser of the pencil, his eyebrows furrowed in deep concentration.
"They definitely didn't think this through."
"We need to establish a sleep schedule. It's very important."
Louis narrowed his eyes at Harry in confusion, plopping down sideways on the sofa with his feet propped up on the middle of the coffee table.
"What?"
"I guess...what? What did you say?"
"I said they didn't think any of this through." Louis waved his hand in the air for emphasis. "Did Liam say anything to you about this? Or Zayn? 'Cause they didn't tell me anything about this."
Harry looked up from the notepad he was scribbling on, his lips pursed to the side and the pencil now stuck behind his ear. The pencil was half-hidden by the curls licking at his temples, his strands of hair long enough to curl below the nape of his neck.
"Nope."
Louis sighed exasperatedly, mouthing around the opening of the bottle. He released the alcoholic beverage with a pop, a drop of liquid glistening on the center of his lips. He thumbed it off, Harry staring at Louis' mouth for a few moments before going back to his reading. Heat began to gather on Louis' cheeks from the way Harry had stared at him, but he brushed it off quickly. Louis licked his lips slowly, the sudden wave of conversation whooshing into his brain from where he left off.
"This is not the kind of thing you just forget to mention. "Hey, Tommo, you see that Laker game last night where Kobe put that juke on that bloke then hit the fadeaway jumper in the end to win it? Oh, and by the way, if I die I'm gonna leave you with my kid." It's messed up!"
Louis leaned back on the sofa, his arms draped gracefully over the cushions. His voice was high-pitched and raspy, almost nearing to a hostile tone.
"Zayn was a planner," Harry explained. "We are part of a plan."
"You wanna walk me through this plan? Are we supposed to live in this house together? Share the place, both sleep deprived? Because that sounds like a compelling psych experiment." Harry laughed humorlessly at this point which made Louis even angrier than he already was. "Assuming of course you and I could even afford to pay for this place."
Harry set his book face down and placed his hands on his lap, his face showing no emotion.
"Andy already said the mortgage has been covered."
Louis started counting on his fingers with every expense that came from owning a house that costed more than their paychecks combined.
"What about the upkeep? Or the utilities? Or the taxes? Do you have any idea what the nut on a place like this is a month?" Louis leaned forward in his place on the sofa, the skin beside his eyes crinkling with concern. "Liam was a junior partner at a law firm. I don't make this kind of money! And what do you do? You bake scones for a living?" He carefully enunciated each word as if he was making fun of Harry's profession.
"I run a successful business, Tommo. I do pretty well for myself actually."
Louis' eyes dropped to Harry's lap. There was a notepad tucked between Harry's crossed ankles in which he had notes scrawled all over it. In Harry's other hand, he held a book that was titled The Sh!t No One Tells You: A Guide to Surviving Your Baby's First Year. Funny, that. Louis snorted and looked up to see Harry's eyes boring into his, the green color intense even from a few feet away.
"Yeah? Well, running a baby is not like running a bakery."
"I didn't say it was."
Louis' voice pitched higher, the stretched vein right above his clavicle visibly pronounced. Harry raised his eyebrows at Louis, amused at how much Louis was getting worked up. Christ, it wasn't even 9 a.m. and Louis' temples were already throbbing with a new headache.
"They're a mess. They pee on things. They bite. They're basically dogs." Harry's face broke out into genuine, soft laughter at that, the book he had been so severely invested in was now completely forgotten. "Except at least a dog knows not to lick the electrical sockets."
As if on cue, Isabella started wailing in the background, fussing and crying out choked sobs.
"Oh, she's up."
Harry stood up immediately to tend Isabella with Louis following closely behind. Isabella was standing up in her crib, her face completely red with tears staining her cheeks. Louis glanced worriedly at Harry before both men approached her cautiously.
"Hey, look at the sleepyhead."
"Hi, honey. Hi."
Louis was about to pick Isabella up when hands smacked his open arms away. He looked at the culprit with a questioning glare, his eyebrows seaming inwards at the contact from where Harry was holding him back. He looked from Harry's long fingers wrapping all the way around his own wrist to Harry's flushed face.
"No, don't pick her up. Don't pick her up."
"Why?"
"Because she needs to learn how to self-soothe. It's really important."
Louis squinted his eyes at Harry for what seemed like the tenth time that day. Harry had probably gone mental with his absurd theory, all bright eyes and sharp teeth snagging on his lower lip. If this was an action comic book, a drawn light bulb hanging over Harry's head would have been long overdue.
"She needs to what?"
"Self-soothe. Soothe herself. I just read it, Tommo, it's important. Let's just give it a minute."
Isabella kept crying, throwing her hands in the air for someone to pay her enough attention to pick her up. Louis resisted the urge to reach out to grab her and instead stayed put, glancing at Harry every so often and waiting for him to make the first move. Harry forced a happy smile on his face and clapped his hands together cheerfully.
"Everything's okay. Happy, happy girl!"
When that didn't seem to work, Harry swung his arms in the air stupidly but held back. Knowing Harry's obsession with pregnant mothers and babies, Louis knew he was dying to pick Isabella up at the first sight of her tear-stained face. Harry seemed to be in deep thought before he snapped his fingers and smiled manically.
"You know what? Let's just sing a song. We'll sing a song. Um, uh, the wheels on the bus go round and round..." Louis caught on quickly, both men singing along, "Round and round, round and round. The wheels on the bus go round and round. All through the town," while clapping their hands to the beat of the song.
Their singing voices died down in their cotton-filled mouths. Fuck. How does that nursery rhyme go again? It was as if the words following all through the town became a little blurry like a drunken dream or the way sometimes Louis had a forgotten name sitting on the tip of his tongue but, for the life of him, he couldn't remember.
Harry's, "The, um, I don't know," made Louis cringe. Louis scratched the top of his head in search for the right words. He remembered the infamous scene in Speed where Keanu Reeves saved the bus, the light bulb going off in bright sparks beside his head instead.
"And then Keanu Reeves saves the bus—"
"Nice."
Fucking genius is what Louis is.
"Saves the bus, saves the bus and then Keanu Reeves saves the bus and then he...that's all I got."
"He dies. Does he die? I don't know."
Harry pouted his lips, pink flesh pinched between his fingers with one hand settled on his hip. He jerked his head to the left and stepped forward.
"Um, okay, maybe she's hungry. I think she's hungry. I'm gonna feed her. Hi, c'mon, let's go eat."
Harry picked up a red-faced Isabella and left to the kitchen, leaving Louis with his lips agape. Louis closed his mouth shut and looked after them, thumbing back to the empty crib.
"I thought we weren't picking her up?"
Harry carefully placed Isabella in her high chair and scrambled to fix something for her to eat. Louis stared at Isabella's crying face for a few seconds before joining Harry in the kitchen where he was mixing a weird food combination in the blender. Hands cradled a cold beer, Louis leaning against the kitchen countertop and watching Harry's best attempts at trying to keep it all together. It was Louis' turn to be amused at Harry's flustered face, the highest points of Harry's cheekbones colored a bright pink.
"Okay, Isabella, sweetheart. I'm almost done."
Harry tapped his fingers on the outside of the blender impatiently, Louis looking over Harry's shoulder. An odd color of green was whirring by the inside of the four plastic walls, Louis wondering vaguely if it was mushed peas. Knowing Harry, it was probably a 4-star exquisite something-related-to-kale meal to trick a baby into thinking it was simple food. Or edible, if that.
A smile teased Louis' lips, his sing-song words whispering over Harry's skin, "She's not a food critic. She's a one-year-old."
Harry opened up the cabinets to retrieve a small bottle of Oregano, twisting the cap with his right hand to sprinkle the spice into the weird-looking baby mush. Alien food, Louis promptly decided, is what it looks more like.
"I know that, Tommo. I'm not gonna feed her just anything."
"They're gonna feed you sometime today, Isabella, I promise. Hopefully before you're two."
Louis downed the rest of his beer, the liquid soothing the burning in the back of his throat. He flicked his fringe out of his eyes with a delicate wrist, squinting his eyes at Harry who was keeping busy preparing Isabella's food.
"So, tell me, what does Isabella do to your, um, dreams of ever meeting a bloke and having your own baby? You even thought about that? You know, a lad your type and age already has a hard enough time competing for the few blokes out there who don't suck."
"I'm sorry, did you just say a lad my age?" Harry asked Louis incredulously, the skin where Louis' hot breath washed over him prickling with goosebumps. "You do realize you're older than me, right?"
"In the dating world, you wouldn't even be considered single, you know that? You know what you'd be? Complicated. Beyond complicated."
Blue eyes followed his movements as Harry rushed over to the drawer and struggled to open it. Harry helplessly yanked on the handle a few times before whipping around to face Louis.
"You don't know anything about me, Tommo."
"Well, I know that you can't open a baby-proof drawer."
Harry looked beneath the drawer to see the lock and unhinged it open. "Oh, there it is." Louis' words taunted Harry even from where he was standing a couple of feet away. Harry sighed and took out the spoon he was looking for, shutting the drawer closed and pushing Louis out of the way. Louis is such a menace, Christ.
"Why are you trying so hard to convince me not to help her?"
"I'm not trying to convince you not to help her. I'm just trying to do what's best for her."
Harry scooped the rest of the blended porridge into the bowl, rising his shoulders only to let them fall. His hair fell in his eyes, Harry looking back at Louis through endless rows of dark eyelashes.
"I think you're trying to do what's best for you, Tommo."
"No, I'm trying to do what's best for her. Okay? And you know what? We're not it."
Harry threw the spoon in the bowl and turned his body towards Louis. He gripped the edge of the countertop with white-knuckled fists, his lower lip trembling with the unspoken words he had thought of since the day he found out they were going to raise Isabella together.
"They loved Isabella more than anything in the entire world and out of everyone, Tommo, they picked us. They picked us."
Louis' lips parted, no fighting words escaping his mouth. Harry took Louis' silence as the initiative to leave, carrying the bowl in both hands and walking over to Isabella who was still crying and squirming in her high chair.
"I'm coming. Check this out. I think you're gonna love it. Taste sensation. Ready?"
Harry pulled up a chair in front of Isabella and scooped up a bit of gooey food, the spoon inches away from Isabella's wailing mouth. When he tried to pry it into her mouth, Isabella shook her head and began fussing in her high chair, tilting her head away in every possible direction from the forced-feeding spoon.
"Mmm. No? Oh, c'mon. Just try it, Bella. Just try it. I think you're gonna love it. Just try it. C'mon, Bella, give it a try. Oh, please?"
Louis scratched the reddening skin underneath the slight stubble on his jaw. He cracked the joints on his thumbs and began to open and close cabinets, Isabella's cries only succeeding in giving him louder and longer pressing beats to his temples. He opened up a cabinet to reveal a tube of Pringles flavored salt & vinegar. He mouthed, "Victory," looking over to see Harry smearing green puree on Isabella's cheek. You win some, you lose some.
"Mmm, mmm. Yum, yum, yum."
Isabella cried harder, her mouth opening up on a high-pitched wail. Harry took this opportunity to shove the spoonful of mash into her mouth. Isabella clamped her mouth shut, her face contorting one into disgust at the odd flavor of the food.
"There you go. Good girl. Bell—"
Isabella coughed, the mush flying in the air to land on Harry's cheek unexpectedly. Harry gasped, Louis' footsteps prodding louder near him. Louis poured Pringles in the space before her, Isabella looking up at him with wide eyes. Isabella popped a potato crisp into her open mouth. Harry remained silent and watched for Isabella's reaction. Isabella chewed silently before her face lit up in delight and munched on another crisp.
"So you honestly think we're the best thing for her?" Louis asked with his jaw clenched, placing the Pringles on top of the kitchen island before leaving the quiet space.
Harry was stunned, the only sound in the kitchen was Isabella's crunching. He was starting to doubt his ability to become a father figure.
Are they the best thing for her?
*
Men and women alike were dressed in their loveliest pressed suits and black gowns. The chatter of people buzzed in the soft atmosphere, their voices soft-spoken.
Loved ones had gathered to Zayn's and Liam's house after the memorial service, their house that once used to be swept up with loud parties and pinged with laser light shows was now calm and strange with hushed voices carrying over the sounds of scraping forks and fizzling drinks.
Snooty neighbors were formed in a half-circle, sipping alcoholic beverages out of flutes with proper etiquette. There was champagne for the adults and apple cider for the children as it was a somber event, but not so solemn as to prevent family and friends from letting loose and maybe sharing a laugh or two in remembrance of Zayn's and Liam's wild nights. Zayn and Liam had spent most of their pre-Isabella lives throwing parties that it would have been a dishonor to their reputations to not include alcohol in their post-funeral gathering. They were quite the party animals before Isabella came along.
"Well, that was a beautiful service. I did not know that's how they met."
"Oh, that story about Paris. Are you kidding me?" Jade looked towards Perrie with clear confusion clouding her face. "What's gonna happen with the baby? Do we know?"
"Oh, yeah, you didn't hear?" Perrie glanced around the room before lowering her voice, almost like she was telling a sacred secret. "They named one of their friends. The single boy who bakes—"
"And the super hot one that always smells like so good and sweaty," Luke added casually, his partner Ashton, who was holding up their daughter, looking at him with raised eyebrows.
"That's interesting. So he'll be around."
"Good."
Perrie's husband, Alex, frowned, the sharp prongs of his fork bumping into his plate.
"What did you mean by "so good and sweaty?""
After the whole incident with Isabella and the flying food, the last thing that was in Harry's mind was taking care of her as his real daughter as he initially intended to do. Maybe Louis' words had a huge reason in their decision to scout family members in search for Isabella's new guardian but, still, Harry was taking all the chances he could get.
Louis and Harry both led busy lives and it wasn't that Isabella was interrupting that, per say, but in all honesty, Harry wasn't so sure they could live up to the potential Zayn and Liam saw in them. Matter of fact, what the hell were Zayn and Liam thinking anyways? It would have made sense if Louis and Harry were actually together, but they weren't, and raising a child with two people that couldn't stand each other didn't necessarily paint a pretty picture. So family members it was. Plus, it wouldn't be that hard to find an eligible guardian to take care of Isabella. Right?
Harry set down a plate filled with food in front of an elderly man and smiled politely at him. His long legs extended in wide steps to reach his mother Anne. He put a hand to Anne's shoulder, smiling down at her gratefully.
"Mum, thank you so much for being here this week. I couldn't have done it without you."
Anne craned her neck upwards and smiled sincerely, the skin beside her eyes crinkling. Her hair was pushed up from her forehead with her posh sunglasses, a delicate hand giving Harry a tight squeeze on the hip before cradling Isabella to her chest snugly.
"You're welcome, honey."
"Do you mind watching her for another minute? I gotta go talk to Tommo and some family members."
Anne nodded as Harry squeezed her shoulder kindly and walked over to Louis, noting how Isabella was acting like the perfect little angel for his mum. Harry scoffed at himself. Maybe he wasn't cut out to be a dad or maybe Isabella was just trying to make his life harder. He decided on the latter and approached Louis, signaling him to come over. Louis stood up quickly, one hand smoothing down the lapels of his speckled suit with his other holding a sweating beer.
"Tommo, there's a lot of them."
"Well, we just need to find one."
Harry nodded and they proceeded to venture into the masses of people. It was a silent agreement for them to split apart and talk to family members alone, that way they could cover up more ground without having to waste precious time. If everything seemed hopeless, they would unite in the end and tackle on Liam's father as he was their last and only resort of getting out of the mess that Zayn and Liam destined for them to take.
Harry had appreciated Zayn's zen view of life, but lately he was starting to abhor every word Zayn had once said that had to do with fate and destiny and especially that God awful motto of his: Just close your eyes and enjoy the roller coaster that is life.
It's all bullshit.
Harry sauntered towards a woman with rebellious curly hair and looked over his shoulder to see Louis was already staring back at him. Louis offered Harry two energetic thumbs up before turning back around, Harry dropping his head and smiling softly.
"So I understand you're Liam's cousin," Louis strained his voice over the sound of kids yelling in the background.
Children ranging from all ages were running up and down the stairs, a few of them crashing into Louis' back and slipping and sliding on the polished floorboards. Louis loved kids as much as the next bloke, but he was doing everything in his power to not yell at the top of his voice and scold the little scoundrels into a single respectful file.
Louis smiled with his lips pressed shut, wild commotion behind him like an untamed circus. It only took a moment for one of them to fall off the banister, Louis pursing his lips and keeping his eyes trained on Liam's cousin's face.
"Hey! Don't climb that! Hey, hey! Who is that? Tyler?" Liam's cousin's—Randy? Riley? Louis wasn't good with names—face scrunched up like he couldn't figure out a difficult maths problem.
"Mason," Ross' wife replied calmly.
"Mason, take a seat right now. Let's go." Ross turned to Louis to say, "Eight kids."
"Eight kids?" Louis said in an astonished statement rather than a question. "You guys have eight kids?"
"Nine, dear," Ross' wife whispered behind him, sliding her eyes over to Louis' surprised face.
"Nine. Right." Ross blew hot air out of his lips, nodding to himself and chuckling quietly. "Baseball team."
Ross smiled tightly, Louis' lips mirroring his grimace.
Ross crossed off the list.
Louis gritted his teeth behind closed lips, his grip tightening around the neck of the beer bottle. He rolled his head on his neck, nibbling on his lower lip and hoping Ross wouldn't notice his unsettled demeanor. His gaze drifted above the heads of people, automatically searching for a familiar head full of curly hair. He stopped when it landed on not one but two curly heads, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards.
Louis only hoped Harry was doing better than he was. Harry's charm was always so easily swallowed up by guests and new friends. While Louis would stand in the corner and roll his eyes until he nearly blinded himself, people would be flocking over to Harry like a sea of birds, tuning in to every word that fell from his lips. He never understood why people were always so enchanted by Harry but looking at him now from across the room without excessively rolling his eyes, he finally understood why. From the way Harry leaned in with attentive, vibrant green eyes to the way he carried himself by clasping his hands behind his back in a boyish manner—it was all too endearing. Harry's magnetic spellbind better pull some strings or else they would be in big trouble.
"I had to come for Zayn," Sasha, Zayn's cousin, said in a trembling voice, an embroidered napkin dabbing underneath her right eye.
"Yeah. Thank you." Harry nodded, crossing his arms over his chest.
"And I was in tour in London so..."
"Oh, on tour?" Harry piped up.
Harry started mentally scanning for Zayn's long list of family cousins and not one of their job listings have mentioned any sort of fame. Looking from the curly wisps of hair framing Sasha's face and a tasteful emerald dress hugging her curves in all the right ways, Harry supposed she resembled the female embodiment of rockstar Mick Jagger.
"Are you performing anywhere that I would know?"
"I'm dancing at Platinum Lace London tonight. And then SophistiCats Tuesday's through Saturdays."
Harry's lips parted open in a shocked sigh, the revelation stunning him with open curiosity rather than judgement. He remembered Louis mentioning he used to hold meetings at a strip club, specifically SophistiCats, for his raunchier directors.
Ah. That also explained the neckline of Sasha's dress dipping well below her collarbones, the material drawn tight across her chest and exposing her cleavage.
"Oh, how exciting. That's really exciting."
Sasha crossed off the list.
Louis and Harry were sitting down on a white plush couch across from Liam's father Geoff. Louis' back was hunched with his forearms hanging off his knees, his hands clasped together tightly. Harry's fingers were laced on top of his knees, his left leg crossed towards Louis.
While they were engaging in pleasant conversation, Isabella was sitting down to Harry's left by his feet and playing absentmindedly. Geoff was so old that he had to carry a portable oxygen tank with him everywhere he went. A nasal cannula was attached to his nostrils and fastened with an oxygen supply tube that ran along his frail body.
"It's really good for Isabella that she gets to see her grandfather."
Geoff smiled faintly, admiring Isabella who was still playing quietly. Even though Isabella was adopted, it was like looking in a time warp mirror between two different generations. Isabella looked just like Geoff, her cheeks as soft as his skin was paper thin. Brown hair tucked behind her ears similar to Geoff's, her lopsided smile so alike his that it was a perfect contrast between young and seniority. Isabella looked up at Geoff with wide brown eyes, her eyes the color of umber. As Liam was Geoff's only son, he had wanted his adopted child to look as much as his father did, and by the comparison of Isabella and Geoff, Liam had achieved exactly that.
"She looks just like Liam."
"I think she looks just like you."
Geoff raised his eyebrows, Isabella crawling towards him on all fours in her tone down dress and polished shoes. Although Isabella looked like Liam and his father, her personality shown much too alike Zayn's. While she looked like a baby gap model in one minute, the next one her image was completely forgotten with her clothes crumpled and dirt smudged on her hands and knees. The sudden reminder of Isabella painting with Zayn bore into Harry's heart all too sharply, Harry swallowing past the bitter ache in his throat.
"So you have a house in Miami now?" Harry posed a question, looking for any sort of distraction.
Geoff's mouth opened up to speak when Louis interrupted him before he even got a chance to utter a single word.
"Yeah, because we, you know, we were hoping...giving that Isabella is your only grandchild..." Louis licked his lips, starting all over again. "Well, it seems to make the most sense—"
Naturally, that was when Isabella yanked the nasal cannula away from Geoff's nostrils, the tube flying out of control. The prongs spewed air as it flapped on the ground wildly like a fish without water, Geoff coughing uncontrollably. More like Geoff without oxygen.
"Oh! Isabella! No, no, no."
Harry scrambled to catch the spurting tube as Louis hurried to pick up Isabella.
"I'm so sorry."
Harry gave the nasal cannula back to Geoff, looking over his shoulder to see Isabella staring at them innocently. Silent laughter sparkled in Isabella's doe-eyed face that resembled Zayn's puppy eyes far too much. Hmm, wonder where she learned that from.
"You okay?"
Geoff nodded helplessly, still coughing out choked breaths and pressing the tube to his nostrils like a precious inhaler.
"Good as new," Harry laughed nervously, gently patting Geoff's back.
Louis sat down with Isabella in his lap. His smile widened into a grin, Louis holding up Isabella's wrists and waving them around the air triumphantly.
"Still breathing!"
Harry mimicked Louis' wild hand gestures and punctured out a weak, "Yay!"
The realization from the incident was a clear response as to whether or not Geoff would take care of Isabella dawned on both of them at the same time, their smiles fading quickly. Harry dug his hands into his hips, ignoring the long, unwavering stare he was receiving from Geoff's direction.
Geoff, the last possible name, crossed off the list.
After everyone went home and everything was cleaned up, (without Louis' help) Louis and Harry lounged in the living room. A baby monitor sat between them on the couch, Isabella's gurgles sounding static over the radio. The night was silent and mourning just like them.
Louis toed off his uncomfortable dress shoes and threw himself on the sofa, bringing his fuzzy socks to rest on top of the coffee table. A cool beer was wrapped in his hands while Harry's eyes burned a hole on the carpet.
"Well, we could go with the nine kids family." Louis lulled his head on his neck to look at Harry, his voice a gentle tone. "I mean, they clearly know how to keep a child alive."
When no response from Harry came, Louis' mouth trembled, his ankles crossing and uncrossing.
"Stripper seemed nice."
Then Harry did look at Louis, his expression bored and his eyelashes blinking once. He pursed his lips in a pout, his arms crossing against his chest.
"Yeah. Grandpa's a definite no," Louis drew out in a long breath. He took one large gulp from his beer and sighed an exhausted, "We're screwed."
Harry could sympathize. It had been a long day of catering after snooty neighbors and upset family members. Harry's toes had been stuffed in one size too small shoes all day and he had held back tears in sake of acting strong in front of the others. He knew crying wasn't going to bring back Zayn and Liam. Even if it did, he was much too busy to let his grief smother him in a thick blanket of sorrow. He was now going to be bombarded with buying nappies at Tesco and postponing all his expansion plans at his bakery shop in lieu of saving money for all the expenses a child came with. He could see his new life unfold right in front of him—changing nappies in the loos and being that tired mother with a fussy child in public. He had no idea how in the hell he was going to manage, but he had no other option, did he?
Furthermore, all that determination to find a new guardian was now drained out of Harry, exhaustion dragging his limbs heavy. Wordlessly, Harry snatched the bottle away from Louis' fingers and swallowed down a mouthful. Louis glanced at Harry out of his peripherals, his lips twitching with a smile. He reached over and patted Harry's thigh, Harry's throat tightening and the beer suddenly turning sour inside his mouth.
Harry was brave enough to tilt his head to the right, Louis too busy focusing on his fingernails. God, was Louis insufferable at times but a gorgeous insufferable twat as well. Much too frustrated at their failed mission to find a new guardian left Louis running his hands through his hair all day. Louis' locks of hair were sticking out in all possible different directions, his fringe pushed up and a little sprig of a cowlick stood up on the back of his head. His shirttails were tucked out and Harry could make out the outlines of his braces hidden by his coat. Harry had no idea how Louis did it, but Louis Tomlinson had pulled off the sex look without even having sex.
Suddenly, everything felt too tight and Harry thought he might die because Louis was right next to him, yet it felt like he was miles away. Louis that made a booty call in front of Harry, Louis that saved Harry from a panic attack, Louis that punched a guy for Harry when he got uncomfortable with the stranger's overbearing flirting. Louis that Harry knew so well and now it felt like a hard punch to his gut because he didn't know him at all. Not really. Because Louis was a person with so many layers that Harry could never figure out. It was like a stranger was sitting next to him rather than the same pesky Louis that had been present in his whole lifetime.
"Earth to Harry." Louis waved his hand in front of Harry's face, his expression borderline smug. "Y'alright, mate?"
Harry blinked rapidly a few times, regaining consciousness. He nodded weakly, turning to look the other way and pinpointing his attention to a random picture frame hanging on the wall.
Harry possibly couldn't get drunk off one sip of beer. Then why does it feel like it?