Louis couldn't help but feel left out.
A week later, he woke up to a familiar scene. In the bed next to his, Niall was curled up in Liam's arms after another nightmare, both of them fast asleep. Downstairs, Harry and Zayn were talking in the kitchen, their soft voices reverberating through the walls. Every morning, he would attempt to wake Liam up only to be tiredly swatted away and told to go back to bed, and then he'd go downstairs only to be told that Zayn and Harry were trying to talk and that he could come back down in ten minutes when they were done.
But not today. Today he decided he was going to go and see Cal, or maybe Ashton, from the children's home. Hopefully they wouldn't ignore him. He was getting sick of it.
He didn't know where either of them lived exactly, but he figured he'd find his way. Besides, once he had his jeans and jacket on and his shoes were laced up, he figured it was too late to go back. The fact that nobody noticed him slipping out of the front door only made him more certain that they didn't want him there, and so he started walking.
As he walked along, the small seven year old began to kick random stones and mumble underneath his breath.
"Stupid Liam, stupid Zayn. Stupid me for calling them Dad and Papa. Stupid Harry and stupid Niall," he mumbled.
Of course, he wasn't really mad at the two boys whom he called brothers now. He knew that Harry was still sick and he probably would be for a long time, even though he was smiling more the last few days - but he never got a look in with his Zaynie - his Papa - anymore, and so he blamed his older brother for that.
And he still loved Niall too, he understood that he was still having nightmares, even if he didn't wake up screaming every night. He could tell by the tired eyes and the way he hadn't even shouted once the past week, just been all mushy and clingy, always choosing to sit by Louis at school and almost fall asleep leaning against him on the playground - even when they were standing up. But he missed his Liam - his Dad - waking him up gently every morning and so he blamed his brother for that.
Mostly, he was mad at his parents - or his carers - or whatever it was he should call them. Right now, he didn't care about any of that. All he cared about was finding somebody who wouldn't ignore him for a couple of hours.
However, somewhere in his musings, he seemed to take a random turn and suddenly he was on a street full of people, completely lost.
Trying not to panic, Louis looked through the crowds of people rushing around to get to where they needed to be and tried to spot a familiar face. When that didn't work, he decided to try and push through and find somewhere familiar. But, he couldn't move easily.
He knew he wasn't claustrophobic like Ni, and he even liked small places because they made him feel safe. But being pushed around by all those people was more than enough to make him panic. He felt his eyes prick with tears and his breathing grow heavy as he tried to push past a group of men in business suits. Then somebody grabbed him and he started to cry a little harder, terrified that he was going to be lost forever, or that maybe that Keith that Niall was so scared of had gotten him.
He didn't even calm down when he saw that it was a lady with kind eyes and a baby on her hip that had caught his arm.
"Sweetheart, where are your parents?" she asked. Louis stared at her for a second before he yanked his arm out of her grip and ran as fast and far as he could.
He couldn't see much through the tears, which was probably why he didn't see the edge of the curb until he twisted his ankle on it. He stopped running and saw that he was on a much emptier street now, filled with dingy houses and worn fences, somewhere else that he didn't remember seeing before. His eyes were still crying, his nose was running, his lungs were wheezing from running so hard and his ankle was throbbing too much to carry on running.
So he sat down and allowed himself to carry on crying.
He had been thinking about how stupid his family was before, but now he was thinking about how stupid he had been to have tried to leave them.
#
Niall woke up about an hour later, unsurprised to see Liam next to him with his arms wrapped lightly around his waist. He decided to leave the man to sleep and managed to quietly maneuver himself from the bed and onto the ground. He frowned when he saw that Louis' bed was empty. The boy would usually still be in bed on a Saturday.
Not thinking too much of it, he rubbed the sleep from his eyes and quietly pattered towards the stairs, glancing in every room on the way to look for his brother. His brother. It felt strange to think that he had brothers now...he still wasn't sure on what to call Liam and Zayn. Louis had started to call them Daddy and Papa, but he wasn't sure that he should.
Louis wasn't upstairs. Niall sighed tiredly. Usually, Saturdays consisted of the two of them sitting on the couch with their cereal and watching cartoons together whilst half asleep. Niall liked that part of the routine they had going on in the house, he liked spending time with Louis. Louis seemed to be the only one who still treated him the same since he had woken up screaming last week, everyone else was treating him like he was soft (though, he had to admit that he did enjoy all of the cuddles).
With a yawn, Niall shuffled into the kitchen, where he found Zayn and Harry. They were both sipping coffee, Harry tapping away on his phone and Zayn watching him with a look on his face that Niall had learnt showed care and love. He turned his gaze to Niall as he entered the room and rubbed his eyes.
"Morning, kiddo," he greeted, voice soft as he put down his mug and held out his arms. Niall clambered up onto his lap and rested his head against his chest, yawning. "How'd you sleep?"
Niall just shrugged, then frowned as he looked around the room. "Where's Lou?" he asked.
Zayn chuckled. "Still in bed, I imagine," he said.
Niall shook his head, starting to worry a little as unwanted thoughts crept into his head. "He's not. He's not anywhere upstairs anywhere," he said, just as Liam wandered into the room, still in yesterday's clothes.
"Why was the front door left open?" he asked, and Zayn jumped up so fast that Niall almost fell off of his lap.
"Shit," he said, grabbing his jacket and tugging it on. Harry had put his phone down now, and was looking up with wide eyes as he put two and two together. Niall was temporarily shocked that he had just heard Zayn swear, despite being told himself many times before that he wasn't allowed to. Then he snapped out of it and began to worry as well.
"You don't think..." Harry trailed off as Zayn quickly slipped his shoes on by the back door.
Liam frowned, less tired now. "What's going on? Where's...oh, no. He's run off again, hasn't he?"
Zayn nodded. "We're gonna have to take the car. God knows how long he's been gone," he said, his voice calm but rushed at the same time.
Liam sighed, turning to Harry. "Think you could keep an eye on Ni for five minutes? I doubt he's gotten far. I swear, when I get my hands on that boy..." he shook his head. Zayn frowned.
"Don't be like that, Li. You know he only takes off when something's getting to him.Let's just set out and get him home. It looks ready to rain out there," he said. Liam allowed the tension to drop from his rigid shoulders and nodded.
"You're right. We won't be long boys," he said, before his eyes landed on Niall, who was breathing heavily behind Harry. "Ni, baby, don't worry -"
"What if Keith got him? What if he came when we were sleeping and - and," he broke off into heavy breaths as he rubbed at his chest, verging on another panic attack.
Zayn sighed, about to intervene when Harry spoke.
"Don't worry. I can take care of him, you guys go get Lou..." he trailed off, then looked up at Zayn with a small smile. "Don't worry, Papa. You and Dad go bring our brother home, we'll be fine here," he said.
Zayn and Liam could have cried on the spot, but there wasn't enough time. So, they simply settled for hugging the teen boy and hurrying out the door to go and search for one of their youngests.
Meanwhile, Harry turned to Niall, who was almost panting. He knelt down in front of him and took both of his hands. He laid one over his own chest and one over Niall's, remembering how Liam used to help him calm down from a panic attack when he had first moved into the home. He would have them quite frequently for the first few months, maybe even half a year - mostly whenever he thought about the fire that took his birth family from him.
"Just match our breathing, Ni. You got it, come on," he soothed, smiling when the boy seemed to calm down fairly easily, watching the older boy with wide eyes. "That's it..."
Niall shook his head, letting his hair flop forward. "If Keith took him, he'll hurt him bad. He's a bad guy, Haz, he won't care that he's a kid...he never cared that I was a kid," he murmured.
Harry sighed at that and pulled his younger brother into his chest. "It's okay, Ni. Let's sit," he said, leading the boy to the couch and sitting down beside him. "Lou's a wanderer. He's been running away since the day we got him, when he was three. Back then, he'd disappear at least once a week. He's always okay."
"Doesn't he like it here? With us?" he asked, wiping his nose on the back of his hand tearfully.
Harry smiled. "Course he does. He just forgets that he's not big enough to go out on his own yet, he doesn't know his way around. Sometimes he gets a little mixed up, and he thinks people don't love him as much as they do -"
"I love him," Niall interrupted, brows furrowed. Harry smiled again.
"So do I. But we all sometimes think things that aren't true," he said.
Niall nodded, then hesitated. "Is that why you're sick? Because you don't think people love you as much as they do?" he asked, innocently.
Harry seemed taken aback by the question and he blinked quickly to stop his eyes from watering.
"I love you just like Louis," Niall said, leaning into his side.
Harry managed a tearful smile and wrapped his arms around the younger boy. "I love you too, Ni. And don't worry about Lou. He'll be okay. We all will."
#
Liam was beginning to wonder if maybe this would be the time that they had to get the police involved for once when he finally spotted him - the small boy curled up on the lip of the curb in some rough neighbourhood.
He barely waited for Zayn to stop the car before he was opening the door and running out to the boy. It had begun to rain, and the kid was shivering, his eyes bloodshot from obvious tears, and his hands wrapped firmly around his ankle. Any anger the man had was instantly forgotten.
"God, Lou," he mumbled. The boy began to sniffle as soon as he saw the men approaching him.
"Daddy," he cried. "I'm sorry."
"Hey, shh, let me take a look at you," Liam hushed, as Zayn took off his coat and laid it over his shoudlers. The shivering boy took it without question, sinking into it's warmth as Liam wrapped his arms around him.
Zayn took to peeling the boys hands away from his ankle, sighing when he saw that it was slightly swollen - though thankfully not bruised. "It's just a twist," he said, then flashed the boy a smile. "Still hurts though, hm?" he said.
Louis nodded quickly, sniffling again. "Yeah," he murmured, teeth chattering as the rain grew heavier.
Liam and Zayn exchanged glances, knowing they would be dealing with another sniffly boy now that Niall's flu was completely gone. "Alright, little man. Let's get you to the car now, yeah?" he said.
Louis nodded, allowing the doctor to scoop him up and lift him into the back of the car. Zayn sat in the back with him, whilst Liam climbed into the front and turned on the engine, making sure the heat was turned all the way up. He turned around to where Zayn had bundled the kid up in a blanket from the back and had gently propped his leg up on the seat, the boy leaning against his chest gently.
"What were you thinking, Lou? I thought we were past all this running away stuff," Liam murmured, reaching out to take his hand. Louis pulled it away and dropped his chin to his chest, silent tears rolling down his cheeks as the shivering died down.
"You don't really care. All you care about is Niall and Harry, because they're your favourites now. I don't matter anymore," he said, not looking up because he felt guilty as soon as the words left his mouth.
Liam sighed. He was getting the feeling that not only was Lou feeling left out and unwanted again, he was also a little jealous this time. Before, there had been just him and Harry, which allowed them each to have one of the men. Now, it was more difficult to divide the three of them between two parents.
"Lou, darling. You know Harry's -"
"Poorly, and Niall's scared and they both need you all the time. I know that stuff...but what about me?" he asked, looking up with teary blue eyes. "I don't want to be selfish, but sometimes I need you too. I have to keep Niall awake at school and I don't get my own work done, and I get scared every time I hear Harry crying because I know that means he's not better yet, and you missed my football game last week because you were busy, and I try so hard to be good but I don't want to be good all the time," Louis was almost sobbing by the end of it, and the two men felt their hearts squeeze with guilt. They had really neglected him that much?
"Little man, you should've come to us. We could've -"
"But I know you need to look after Harry and Niall now, so it doesn't matter if I need your help. I can't ask for it, because they need you more. That's why I was going to see Cal, so I wouldn't have to bother you," he whispered, then looked down at his lap again as tears continued to fall. "I just made everything worse though. I'm sorry," he murmured.
Zayn and Liam both held him tightly at that. "Baby, you don't need to apologise. We're the ones who're sorry, okay? We're always here for you though, alright? If ever you have a problem, don't even think about comparing it to anyone else's, you just come straight to us. We love you so much."
"So, so much, Lou," Zayn added, tightening his hold on the boy as he cried.
They both made a silent vow in that moment to never let any of their boys go.
#
Louis was tackled as soon as the door opened.
He had managed to hobble his way from the car to the front door, because the pain was dulling down and he knew that he would be getting special treatment for the rest of the weekend, so he figured that he should have a few more moments of being independent.
But when the front door opened, he ended up being almost knocked off his feet anyway as Niall grabbed him into a hug. "Ni, I'm okay," he said, though he couldn't hold back the smile as he hugged his brother back with just as much force.
"You're a stupid idiot, Lou," Niall whispered in reply, though his words weren't intended to be mean. "I thought Keith got you," he added, squeezing him tighter.
The other seven year old copied his actions, returning the embrace again. "I'm sorry," he murmured.
When Niall had pulled away and hovered closely beside him, Harry ruffled his hair. "You have got to be the least streetwise kid to ever exist," he told him, and Louis smiled and hugged him, feeling Zayn's hand on his shoulder. He looked up.
"Come on you, let's get you warmed up and that ankle wrapped," he said.
Louis smiled. At that moment, he wasn't sure why he had ever doubted for a moment that his family loved him.
Because he really did love them.
EDITED 14.12.21