"Where's Harry?"
Liam, Louis and I all shrugged. None of us had any idea where he was. We'd tried texting, calling, we even checked the car park, but we couldn't find him.
"We don't know," I replied.
"Well, have you tried to get a hold of him?" The man in the fancy suit questioned bluntly, as if we were stupid.
Louis scoffed and rolled his eyes, "yes, Bart, we have."
"Hey, there he is!" Liam chirped, waving animatedly. Sure enough, Harry had appeared in the doorway looking a little worse for wear. Bart turned briskly on his heel and roughly clapped Harry on the back as he shoved him into position beside the rest of us. It probably wasn't as rough as he made it look, but Harry seemed weaker today, less like his usual self. His face was pale and drawn and there were bags the colour of storm clouds obvious beneath his shot eyes.
"Finally thought to join us Styles." Bert smiled cynically,
"Sorry, I was just in the bathroom," Harry replied, keeping his gaze toward the floor.
From beside me, Louis tugged my arm and nodded in Harry's direction with a questioning look. I shrugged, frowning. Maybe he was sick.
Bart clapped his hands, "righty then lads, are we ready to get started now then?"
To begin, Bart and the other producers wanted to try do some parts all together in the booth, so we trailed behind the crew to where we needed to be. I lagged behind, next to Harry, and nudged his shoulder lightly, "you okay man?"
Harry blinked, looking shocked that he'd been spoken to. He glanced at me wearily and then his shoulders slumped, "yeah, I think I'm just a bit out of it today. Been tough sleeping with all the partying happening beside my place and I think I'm coming down with something."
"I hate to say it, but you don't look very good," I said, my eyebrows etched together. "Have you been around to tell the neighbours off?"
"They're just kids, doing what kids do. I'll get used to it," Harry murmured. He ran a hand through his unruly hair, obviously not done that morning, and the pulled his sleeves down over his hands with a light clear of his throat.
"That's not fair Haz, what are you going to do until then? Because I don't think you can last much longer like this. How much sleep did you get last night?" I asked, beginning to worry. It really looked like he hadn't had any at all.
"I don't think I got any," Harry whimpering, only proving my worries to be warranted. Poor guy, I wouldn't even be semi functional on no sleep and here he was supposedly about to record for the whole day.
"And you're not feeling well?"
"No. . ." Harry shrugged his shoulders, trying to appear careless, "I'll be okay for today though, I promise. I'm only feeling kind of rough around the edges, it's nothing too bad."
"Hazza. . ."
"Oi! You two, you're lagging behind. Hurry it up!" Bart yelled, hanging off of the booth door at the end of the hall.
"Come on then Ni, guess we're too slow for Bart's liking." Harry grinned. It was noticeably forced and I muttered under my breath to myself as Harry pulled me after Bart, "nothing we do is to Bart's liking."
We'd been in the studio a lot over the past few weeks, organising another album as best we could. Writing was practically over thankfully, it was always the hardest part, but now we actually had to learn all these new songs and get them recorded. First, Bart had us go through the entire album once. No pauses, no feedback, just one long recording that included every song.
Then the band got a break while the producers listened to it all and picked out all the parts that needed working on. We were sent back to the break room where thankfully someone had been to set out food.
Harry sat down heavily on the couch and the rest of us went silent. He dropped his head into his hands and rubbed his eyes hard.
Louis and Liam looked at me. I didn't know why they thought I knew anything more than they did.
"You alright Hazza?" I murmured cautiously, slowly lowering myself into the couch beside him. At this point I was scared I was going to give him a fright just by sitting there. He'd been so jumpy all morning, dropping microphones and tripping on air every few minutes.
"Gotta headache," he whined. He looked as if he was about to cry and I wasn't sure whether he was just too tired or if he was feeling that unwell. Either way, I didn't think the studio was the right place for him to be.
"Do you want to go home? I'm sure we can sweet talk Bart into letting us take you?" I offered softly.
"Yeah, totally." Liam nodded in agreement.
"It's too loud there." Now he was slurring.
"Jesus, how many nights haven't you slept Harry?" Louis exclaimed, nudging Harry's head up with his hands.
"I don't even know. . ."
"Okay, it's alright, doesn't matter. You can just sleep here. Look, here's a cushion, lay down Haz," I directed, gently pressing him against the pillow I'd shoved up against the arm of the couch.
"We've got to work," Harry mumbled sleepily. He was pushing a little against our best effort to get him to lay down but his eyes were drooping shut, it was obvious it wasn't going to be difficult for much longer.
Liam chucked a blanket over him and we all sighed in relief as a snore came from his parted lips.
"Alright boys, we need Harry in the booth now!"
Great.
I tried my best to convince Bart and the others to let us at least take Harry back to my place but they weren't having any of it, apparently there was plenty of time he could rest in between time in the booth so he should be just fine. It was true, but I doubted Harry could do any more singing at all. When we woke him up again he'd hardly had five minutes shut eye and there was no change at all, he still looked like he was about to pass out with every step and it wasn't very confidence inspiring.
Liam, Louis and I sat behind the glass and watched Harry carefully as he struggled through the parts Bart was demanding him to sing. I had to give the guy some credit, he sounded as if he really was trying to be gentler with Harry, but it wasn't enough to really make any difference.
At one point after about quarter of an hour Harry's voice completely trailed off into silence and his eyes started following something invisible on the walls around him. His glossy eyes very quickly increased to the size of dinner plates and he was off his chair scrabbling to try get away from whatever it was he could see.
I stood up too and craned my neck to make sure I hadn't just missed something, but there really wasn't anything there.
"What's wrong with him?" Louis squeaked.
Then Harry let out an ear piercing scream and fell onto his knees, sobbing hysterically and covering his head with his arms.
In less than I split second I was throwing open the door and rushing inside, not even mildly sorry as I stomped on Bart's toes on the way.
I crouched down beside Harry but he floundered away at my touch, shaking and crying out again loudly. I flinched, reminding myself that it was something to do with him, not me.
Terrified, he peered through his fingers at the walls, "can't you see them?"
"Well isn't this just like every fucking horror movie I've ever seen," Louis stated, backing out of the booth.
I glanced at the walls just one more time to make sure there really was nothing there. Sure enough, just paint. He was seeing things, hallucinating. This is what happened when your idiot teenager neighbours kept you up all night for days on end!
"I promise that whatever you're seeing Haz, it isn't there," Liam said calmly.
I tried touching Harry again and thankfully this time he allowed it, smooching in closer and hiding his face in my shoulder. It got boiling hot fast and I shared a look with Liam, mouthing a short word to him, 'fever.'
Bart poked his head into the room, "what's going o-"
"Fuck off," I barked. Bart raised his brows and disappeared. Liam followed him out.
"Close your eyes," I whispered to Harry as Liam returned with a cold water bottle.
"Everyone still alive in there?" Louis called out.
"Yes, you idiot." Liam rolled his eyes. He sat down beside Harry and I and softly pressed the bottle to the side ofHarry's face as he touched his other cheek for a gage at how hot he really was.
"You're exhausted and you have a burning fever Mate, there's really nothing there I promise," Liam said.
Harry took a deep breath as Liam shifted the bottle to the other side of his face. He opened his eyes and cautiously peered around, his grip on my shirt slacking.
"I swear there were snakes," he muttered, "and it was getting smaller. They were getting closer, I couldn't, I didn't know-"
"Don't work yourself up," I ordered.
"I'm not cruel enough to make the lad stay after that episode, I'm perfectly happy if you lads still wanted to get him out of here. And maybe you should stay with him a while, that was- well, that was something else," Bart called from the other room. Apparently snapping at him scared him out of wanting to come back in.
"Fucking finally," Liam uttered.
After Harry had calmed down completely we helped him stand up. It was a slow process and loading him into the car was something else entirely. We stopped a total of eight times on the way out to the carpark because he kept getting dizzy, and then when we finally actually got in the car I didn't even have the chance to start up the moto before he yanked open the door and threw up all over the concrete. It just about knocked him unconscious and Louis had to do his seat belt for him.
At my place I dug out some fever reducers for him to take and then the lads and I put him in my bed since it was the biggest and by far the comfiest (I had friends but the guest bed was fairly new and still pretty stiff) and he very promptly rolled over and feel asleep without any hassle at all.
And then he slept and he slept and he slept. It was like he was dead and after fifteen hours I did go check to make sure he was breathing still. It was eight in the morning and he'd slept all through the afternoon and the night like a baby. He did wake a few times but not completely, it was more of a few blinks and then straight back into deep impenetrable slumber.
It was another two hours before he appeared in the kitchen.
"Hey, Harry! How ya feeling?" Louis greet chirpily, "no more hallucinations?"
Harry groaned and blushed red, "don't even remind me. You know, I can hardly remember it at all? I think I was mostly catatonic for the whole of yesterday."
Liam lead him to sit down and felt for his fever again. He hummed and nodded, pleased, "you don't feel much warmer than normal now. You got really hot yesterday."
Harry shrugged, "I actually don't feel half bad now. I could probably sleep for another two days but other than that and the wisps of a headache. . . You've got food Ni?"
I nodded, "of course I have food, where do you think we are? And how could you possibly sleep any more? That was almost eighteen hours!"
Harry shrugged and yawned as I threw a packet of biscuits at him, as well as a banana because health you know?
"Well, we're not letting that happen again. How about you lads stay here and Liam and I will go over to your place Haz and scare those neighbours of yours into being as quiet as mice in the night?" Louis rubbed his hands together, "Li?"
"I'm down, we could-"
Louis slapped a hand over his mouth, "Sh, we'll scheme in the car."
"Don't do anything too mean guys, they're just-"
"Kids, I know Harry!"
Harry smiled and took a bite of banana before calling out once more, "okay, thank you!"
Quite difficult to write this one was Lovelies. I struggled, that's why it's a bit short. Hopefully the next one will be longer, and hopefully this will satisfy you for tonight! (Well, it's my night, I dunno what time it is for you hahah)
Have a lovely day, morning, afternoon, whichever fits for ya!
The next request is for: sarahtheweirdo
Also, haven't even read this through because I don't want to make myself cringe so I'm really sorry for any typos I may have made.