Archive of Our Own

The first Monday in autumn is gloomy. It's one of those days where it looks like it's the evening even in the morning because the cold and the dark are penetrating that deeply. Louis wakes up to a partly cloudy forecast, but when he glances out the living room curtains to his front yard, he can see that the rain is coming down in sheets. When he receives the notification that rain is likely to start in fifteen minutes, he giggles to himself at the inaccuracy. The sidewalks outside are covered in puddles and Louis will probably have to check his basement for flooding, but that's something to worry about later. For now, he just makes his coffee and scrolls through his Instagram feed with tired eyes.

Generally, this would be the type of day that Louis would like to spend either in bed or on his couch watching true crime documentaries, but alas, duty calls.

He and Oli have the morning shift at the bookshop today, so once his coffee's gone cold and the Instagram feed's gotten repetitive, he retreats to his closet to pull on a loose pair of blue jeans and an oversized red jumper. He even takes a few minutes to search for the umbrella that he swears existed in his home at one point in time, but when his last warning alarm goes off, he gives up on the hunt and decides to make a run for it.

He runs through the downpour from his front door to his car and ducks inside as quickly as he can. Before he turns the key in the ignition, he takes a second to recover from the cold droplets that had time to splatter across his face and hair during the short trek. His fringe is fucked up and will definitely need to be fixed, but considering he'll have to make a similar run from his car to the bookshop, he figures it's pointless to try and fix it now. Louis sighs and starts his car.

Likely due to the horrendous weather, the streets are emptier than they usually would be at this hour. The shop is likely to be quiet today, but that means Louis and Oli will have more time to set out next week's new releases. There are a couple of novels that Louis has been excited about since they were delivered a couple of weeks ago, and he hopes his customers will be too.

Louis is about two streets away from the bookshop and humming along to Taylor Swift on the radio when he sees a large dark mass out of the corner of his eye. Before his brain has time to decipher what the mass is, it runs in front of his car. Louis slams on his brakes to avoid hitting it, banging his head on the steering wheel as a result of the sudden stop.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Louis mutters to himself, lifting his head warily to see if he had stopped quickly enough to avoid hitting whatever animal just ran in front of his car. A deer is running into a yard off to the right of where Louis' car is stopped, the obvious culprit for this near-death experience, and despite his annoyance and the pain radiating from his face, Louis is glad he didn't hit the animal. Truthfully, he's still scarred from the frog he accidentally drove over when he had his learner's permit at 16, which led to about three hours straight of crying on his mom's shoulder until she took him to get ice cream to cheer him up. He was too traumatized to drive for four months after that and it delayed the process of getting his license quite a bit, so Louis can only imagine what havoc hitting a deer would wreck on his life.

Louis reaches up to feel around his face gingerly, checking to see how extensive his injuries are after that steering wheel faceplant. Everything feels like it's in one piece, but there's a suspicious wetness on his upper lip, and when Louis pulls his fingers away, they're bloody.

"A fucking bloody nose," Louis mutters with a roll of his eyes. It seems like a very juvenile injury, even more so since he hasn't gotten one since he was about eight years old, and Louis knows that there's a zero percent chance that Oli isn't going to laugh as soon as he sees him. At least if he's wearing that bright orange shirt that clashes with his ginger hair again, Louis will be able to laugh at him right back.

Since everything else with his car and face seems to be in order, Louis eases his foot off the brake pedal and continues on his way.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

When Louis pulls into his usual parking spot on a side street right next to the bookshop, he sees that Oli is waiting by the door. It's not unusual for Oli to arrive there first—it's possible that Louis has been known to be late on rare, or perhaps not so rare, occasions—but Louis knows that he's even later than usual today. Despite the lack of traffic, the poor visibility and the incident with the deer slowed Louis down, and his drive to the bookshop is much longer than Oli's anyway. Or at least, it's longer by about three minutes, but that's his defense whenever Oli brings up his lateness.

"Sorry," Louis calls out as he runs toward the door, holding his arms above his head in a weak attempt to shield himself from the continuing downpour. Oli looks soaked through to the bone and is looking at Louis grumpily, but his eyes widen when he sees the now-dried remnants of Louis' bloody nose still on his face.

"What the hell happened to you?" Oli asks as Louis unlocks the door and puts all his body weight on it to force it open. He lets Oli enter first and then shuffles in after him, closing the door behind them. They both immediately make a beeline toward the area behind the checkout counter—Oli toward the coffee maker, and Louis toward the paper towels he has hidden away in a cabinet so he can get the blood off his face.

"A deer decided to galavant in front of my car," Louis says as he dabs at the blood gently. "Slammed on the brakes and my nose decided it wanted to get up close and personal with my steering wheel."

Oli giggles. "I swear, this kind of shit only happens to you, bro," he says. "I don't think I've gotten a bloody nose since Calvin threw a pencil at my nose in third grade."

"I could throw one at you now," Louis offers, glancing around the counter for a pencil. He's sure they've got one here somewhere.

"Hostile work environment!" Oli yells, but he hands Louis a cup of coffee a few minutes later.

Louis bought this bookshop about five years ago, just a few weeks after his mother passed away. He'd been working as a paralegal for a while before that, and though the job provided him with enough of an income to buy a small, but perfectly cozy house (the same one he lives in to this very day), he always hated it.

As an only child to a single parent, he'd received the entirety of his mother's inheritance and the insurance money from her own house, so he used that money to fulfill a lifelong dream of his. He bought this tiny shop in the center of their small town and converted it into a bookshop. While bookshops are likely to fail these days, their small quirky town embraced Louis' business fully, and within a couple of months, he was able to hire two part-time staff members to help him run it.

Oli and Zayn had been at his side ever since, not only as co-workers but as his dearest friends.

"Hey, twerp, the shop should've opened three minutes ago," Oli says, popping his head out from the back room.

Louis takes back what he said about them being his dearest friends. They're assholes, actually, and Louis will be firing them at his earliest convenience.

Still, Oli has a point. Louis grumbles under his breath about Oli being the actual twerp in this situation, but he still walks over to the front door and pushes it open so he can turn the CLOSED sign to OPEN. He uses one hand to turn the sign and holds onto the door frame with the other, not realizing until it's too late that this is a huge mistake. The rain has slowed down outside but the storm continues, and just as Louis is about to retreat back into the bookshop, a strong gust of wind blows the door closed. Right onto three of his damn fingers.

"Owwwww," Louis howls, pulling his fingers out of the door and clutching them to his chest.

Oli pokes his head back out at the noise, and upon seeing Louis with watery eyes and red, rapidly swelling and bruising fingers, he bursts into action. There are some old ice packs in the freezer in the back room from the time Zayn dislocated his elbow skateboarding a couple of years ago, so Oli helps Louis to wrap those around his fingers.

"Damn, it's really not your day," Oli says when they finish their wrapping.

Louis lays his forehead on the counter tiredly. "Just a little bad luck," he says.

Another throb radiates through his finger and he groans.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

The storms have fully passed by the afternoon and the sun even peeks out from the clouds, brightening up the streets in front of the bookshop. Everything is still very wet and cold, however, so most customers seem to have chosen to remain in their homes or workplaces, and they only get a few customers all day.

Not long after Louis and Oli have their lunch break, Louis finds himself in the back room, popping Ibuprofen to deal with the pain and taking inventory of all the new books that have been delivered, a task that he's been working on diligently since this morning. He's getting bored and would appreciate some human interaction, so he decides to venture out to see if they have any customers that he can help. There are few things that Louis enjoys more in life than guiding customers toward what book to buy, and it would be a nice surprise to be able to do that for somebody on a day that's been so slow and painful so far.

When Louis exits the back room, he sees a customer walking down one of the book aisles and disappearing from sight. Louis glances over at Oli to see if he has any interest in helping, but he finds that his friend and employee is just sitting by the register reading Vogue, apparently unconcerned about the fact that he's still on the clock. Louis would love to make fun of him for his magazine choice, but he knows Oli will just fire back with the time that he caught Louis reading 101 hot sex tips in Cosmo, so he diplomatically chooses to stay silent and seek out the customer himself.

When he finds the customer, the man has wandered to the small religious section that Louis has set up in the back left corner of the shop. He's about 6 feet tall with broad, muscular shoulders, and is dressed cozily in well-worn jeans, a white button-down shirt, with a light pink sweater vest over it. He also has brunette hair that's just long enough to curl slightly around his neck and ears. Louis is immediately intrigued, mostly because this man looks hot, even from the limited view Louis has of him, and as the customer turns around, he pats himself on the back for not giving Oli the chance to help this guy.

"Hi," Louis says breathlessly when he sees how handsome the man's face is. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

The man is holding a bible and thumbing through it, and despite the holy nature of the book he's holding, Louis is thinking very unholy thoughts about the size of his hands.

"Oh, no, that's okay," the man says with a smirk. "I just wanted to come in here because I was in shock."

Louis frowns and takes a step closer. "In shock?" He asks. "Uh, are you okay? I'm not sure I understand what you mean."

"Just because, you know," the man says, closing the gap between their bodies even further. He's right up in Louis' space now, almost impolitely so, but when you're this hot, Louis supposes you can get away with a lot. "I figured bookshops died out years ago. Doesn't everyone with sense get their books off Amazon these days?" He laughs.

Louis' eyes narrow immediately and any attraction he felt dissipates.

"Amazon sells books at reduced prices so they can put independent bookstores out of business and then makes up the revenue loss through the sale of other items," Louis says angrily, crossing his arms across his chest and broadening his stance to appear more intimidating. "Only selfish, capitalist pigs would be willing to buy books from a trillion-dollar company whose entire business model centers around fucking over the little guy. But oh, sorry, I guess it's safe to say you fit in that category."

The smirk on the man's face only widens as Louis speaks. And while Louis definitely shouldn't be saying this to a customer in case they head straight to Google or Twitter or TikTok to leave a horrendous review and bankrupt Louis' little bookshop forever, it's evident that the man is getting a kick out of Louis' anger. In fact, if Louis was not a reasonable person who realizes this handsome but infuriating man in front of him is just a random customer who knows nothing at all about him, he might have assumed that the man had carefully selected his words in order to provoke Louis' rage.

"Is that how you talk to all of your customers? I don't think Amazon ever calls its customers selfish, capitalist pigs..." The man says thoughtfully, taking yet another step closer and using their height difference to his advantage.

Louis exhales through his nostrils and takes a step back, choosing to ignore the fact that this particular selfish, capitalist pig smells like vanilla and smoke, which is a rather arousing combination to him.

"If you need help finding anything, please let my co-worker Oli know," Louis says, voice sickeningly sweet. "I think the bible is probably not what you're looking for, but there are some self-help and how-to books over there that might be more suitable options." Louis points over to a bookcase by the window and spins on his heels before the man has time to respond.

As he walks away, he hears the man chuckling behind him.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Finally, the day is over.

They probably only sold a total of $100 worth of books all day, which is pitiful, but Louis knows the forecast for tomorrow is much better and it's likely that people will finally start showing their faces around town again. The lack of customers meant that Louis was able to get a lot on the business and organizational side of the shop accomplished, even if he had to do so mostly one-handed due to his throbbing fingers. With so few customers stopping by, moving books around, and putting them back on the wrong shelves, there is also little Louis and Oli have to do in order to prep the shop for closing.

They just clean up the coffee and do a quick dusting of the shelves before Louis decides they can call it a night.

"Quiet day," Louis says as he locks up. Oli is waiting for him so they can walk to their cars together, just like always.

"Very," Oli agrees. "There were only like two women and that little kid who came in and that was it. The storm really kept everybody home. I thought maybe things would pick up once it ended, but nope." 

Louis links arms with Oli as they start walking down the sidewalk toward the side street where Louis parked.

"And that tall asshole," Louis adds just as his car comes into his line of vision.

Oli frowns. "What tall asshole?"

Louis glances at Oli with raised eyebrows. "The guy who came in while you were reading your magazine. He was in the religious section, not sure if he looked around anywhere else after that."

"I didn't think anybody came in while I was reading," Oli says when Louis starts unlocking his car door. "I saw you come out from the back room and go over in that direction, but I figured you were headed back there to tidy up—that section doesn't see a whole lot of action, as you're well aware."

Louis is not sure how Oli could've missed the guy coming in considering how few customers they got today, but he supposes Vogue really was just that engrossing.

He shrugs and gets into his car, giving Oli a little wave. "Alright, well, have a good night. I'll see you in a few days—you're working what, Wednesday afternoon? And I'm stuck with just Zayn 'til then."

Oli smirks as he walks backward away from Louis' car, in the direction of his own car parked just a few spots away. "I'm just the superior employee, what can I say," he replies. "Zayn can never, ever compete."

Louis laughs and slams his door closed, not acknowledging Oli's statement—he and Zayn always love to jokingly compete like that, but as a consummate professional, Louis would of course never play along.

He can see Oli still laughing way too hard at his own joke in the rearview mirror as he drives away.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis' fingers are still stiff from slamming them in the door this morning, so the drive home is not exactly pleasant. He survives it though, and hit no deer in the process, so he takes that as a win and pulls into his driveway (mostly) unscathed. There's a soft smile on his face as he wanders up his driveway toward his front door, but it fades as soon as he sees what's sitting right in front of it.

"Not you again," Louis sighs, his eyes narrowing as he gazes at the black cat sitting in front of his door like it owns the place.

The cat just looks at him in response.

"You're in my way," Louis tells it. Despite his words, he knows from experience that this cat, which has no owner but spends so much time at Louis' house that he should start charging it rent, does not care what Louis has to say and is going to be in his way no matter what. He's shooed the cat away from his door a million times and he's called the cat many mean names, but the cat seems to take pleasure in bothering Louis and has never once adjusted his behavior in response to Louis' many complaints.

Louis rolls his eyes and steps around the cat, unlocking his door quickly and opening it just wide enough for him to slide through sideways, not wanting to give the cat a chance to get inside and stake claim to Louis' entire house instead of just his front porch. Squatters' rights are a real thing, and Louis is certain this particular cat is well aware of that.

He manages to get inside his home without letting the cat in, but when Louis peeks out the front window, it's still sitting there, unbothered. Louis knows it still will be tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day, and on and on forever.

Once Louis' changed into a soft hoodie and an old pair of sweat shorts from an ex-boyfriend that are two sizes too big and held up only by the drawstring after the elastic waistband disintegrated with age, he makes his way to the kitchen so he can cook something for dinner. Louis is far from proficient in the kitchen, but even he can manage a sandwich or a grilled cheese. He decides on the latter for tonight's meal, and it doesn't take long for the bread to turn toasty brown in the pan. Louis puts it on a plate and walks over to the table, eyes on his phone as he scrolls through searching for a podcast to listen to through dinner.

He sets his food down on the table and then sits down in the chair that he usually chooses, the one closest to the door, except that this time, as soon as his butt touches the seat, the entire chair collapses.

Louis sits there in a heap of broken chair for a few seconds in shock. He can't believe that actually just happened.

"Fuck," Louis whines finally, once the shock has worn off. He uses his good hand to push his weight off the floor, and once he's standing again, he looks down at the sad state of his favorite chair. "I know I shouldn't have eaten that second muffin at lunch, but this seems excessive," Louis tells it sadly.

He's just about to settle down in another chair so he can eat his meal and try to forget that this embarrassing little incident ever happened when he suddenly hears a popping noise.

"That's embarrassing," a voice says, and Louis wishes he had security cameras at that moment because he knows they'd capture him jumping two feet in the air out of shock.

"Fuck, oh my god, FUCK," Louis yells, jumping back as he sees a man has appeared in his kitchen. Louis has no idea where he's come from or how he got here, and after a second of his brain trying to grapple with the man's sudden presence inside Louis' own fucking house, he realizes that he recognizes this man.

It's the man from the bookshop—though some refer to him as "that tall asshole" or "a selfish, capitalist pig."

That man is in Louis' house and Louis is probably about to die. Or something.

"I'm calling the police," Louis says quickly, frantically reaching for his cell phone, but then there's another pop and the man disappears and reappears. Now, instead of being by the fridge, the man is standing next to the table and picking up Louis' phone before he has the chance to, putting an end to any of Louis' hopes of calling for help.

"Nope, you're not," the man says, and he somehow sounds both bored and amused at the same time.

"This is breaking and entering," Louis informs him, stepping back slowly to put more distance between himself and the man, just as he had in the bookshop earlier.

The man shrugs, but makes no attempt to get closer to Louis. That brings Louis a tiny bit of comfort, but there is still a man who is bigger and stronger than Louis and who might be wielding an ax, knife, gun, or some other deadly weapon on his person standing in Louis' kitchen.

"Is it, though, when I have permission to be here?" The man asks, just as he reaches for Louis' grilled cheese and picks it up.

Louis stares at him like he's a crazy person because no offense, but it's pretty clear that he is.

And then the man takes a bite.

"That's my fucking dinner, you asshole," Louis says, walking forward and snatching the food out of the man's hand before he can eat any more of it. Louis can slice off that contaminated corner with a knife and the meal is still salvageable. If Louis lives long enough to do that, of course.

"Unless you're a 13-year-old, this doesn't qualify as dinner," the man says, nodding toward Louis' grilled cheese. "But anyway, like I said, I have permission to be here. And you're the only one who can see me, so calling the police is pointless."

Louis ignores his first rude comment to focus on the second comment, which seems to be of more immediate importance.

"This is my house and I have not given you permission to be here," Louis says, speaking slowly in the hopes that the man's itty bitty brain will comprehend the words. He's still infuriatingly sexy and muscled and his hair is now tousled in a way that it wasn't when Louis saw him earlier, but no amount of sexy tousled hair and muscles can distract Louis from this situation.

Probably.

"Not permission from you, of course," the man acknowledges. "But from, you know," he trails off and points down.

Louis is confused for a moment, trying to figure out if this man thinks there's somebody in Louis' basement who's given him permission to enter his house or if there's something else going on in his addled brain, but then he sees the meaningful look on the man's face as he points down again and realizes.

"From the devil?" Louis asks. "You must be joking."

"And him," Harry adds, now pointing up toward the ceiling. "You know, they work together on decisions like this."

Louis blinks.

"It's your fault I'm here, really," the man says, shrugging and crossing his arms as he leans back against the wall. "All your guardian angels quit."

Louis closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose, praying with every fiber of his being that when he reopens them, this will have all been a nightmare and his kitchen will be empty of everyone except himself.

Of course, after the day he's had, Louis knows that was just wishful thinking.

Sure enough, the man is still standing there when he reopens them, but now he's eating an apple that he probably stole from the pitifully empty fruit basket that Louis has sitting in the center of his table. If this guy doesn't stop eating Louis' food or pay him back for the groceries he's using up, Louis is going to lose it.

"My guardian angels quit?" Louis asks, pushing aside his annoyance for the food thievery to voice his confusion.

"Yes, they quit," the man repeats as he takes another bite of the apple in his hand. It's an obnoxiously large bite, and the fact that he's chewing with his mouth open doesn't help. At this point, Louis really should just run out of the house, find the first neighbor who will open the door, and call the police, but he can't deny that he's curious.

"What the fuck do you mean, they quit?" Louis asks.

This man—demon, whatever —looks over at Louis with a withering glance before tossing the apple. It misses the trash can by about a foot, falling to the floor of Louis' kitchen and definitely leaving a sticky residue that he's going to have to clean up later.

"You kept getting yourself into trouble and their afterlife experience became too stressful, so they quit. After the fifth guardian angel quit their post last week, there were no other volunteers, so that's where I stepped in. I was getting bored of welcoming souls into hell anyway...they're so goddamn whiney, I'm always like, bro, just shut the fuck up—"

"So you're my guardian demon," Louis says flatly, cutting the demon/man/thing off before he can get any further.

He smiles largely enough to show dimples, which seem like a completely inappropriate thing for a demon to have.

"Exactly," the demon confirms.

Louis makes a show of glancing down at his fingers, still bandaged, and his collapsed chair, still lying in a heap on his floor, and then touches his nose gingerly.

"If you're my guardian demon, aren't you supposed to stop me from getting hurt?" He asks, annoyance seeping out of every syllable. He should probably be more shocked by the guardian demon reveal, but he did just watch this man disappear and reappear via pops, and truth be told, Louis has seen and experienced weirder things in life than this.

Still, his question is an important one.

The demon shrugs. "It's my first day on the job, and there's a bit of a learning curve, I s'pose," he says, offering Louis another winning smile. "Besides, you're fine, right?"

"Aside from my broken and mangled body, yeah, I'm doing great," Louis says sarcastically, offering up his own smile of gritted teeth.

The demon reaches forward and pats Louis on the shoulder awkwardly.

"Glad to hear it. By the way, my name's Harry. It's great to meet you, Louis. I'll be seeing you around, unless you manage to get yourself killed when I'm off the clock," Harry says with a laugh, though it fades slightly when he sees the lack of amusement on Louis' face. "Kidding, kidding. I'm a demon, so I don't sleep. My shifts are 24 hours a day, seven days a week, don't you worry."

There's another pop and Harry's gone, just like that.

And Louis? Well, suffice it to say he's feeling very, very worried.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

After "the demon incident," which is how Louis is referring to it in his mind, he doesn't see Harry for several days. He might have even started to believe that he imagined the whole thing if not for the fact that there's a partially eaten apple sitting in his trash can and a still-broken chair lying on the floor of his kitchen. After the disastrous day that Louis had when Harry first appeared to him, Louis has mostly stayed home and largely managed to avoid most near-death experiences, but knowing his own track record, he should have expected that the respite wouldn't last long.

Louis is currently at the bookshop with Zayn and there's been a steady stream of customers all day, mainly due to the recent release of a new novel by a popular young adult author. The teenage girls who are ensuring the books fly off the shelves are very interested in Zayn and all day, they have been coming up with excuses to stay in the shop longer in the hopes of catching his attention. Though Louis can tell it's driving Zayn up the wall to be on the receiving end of a bunch of underage girls' undivided attention, Louis finds it rather amusing. Besides, the longer somebody stays in a shop, the more money they are likely to spend. Zayn can deal with some teenagers crushing on him for the good of the bookshop—or at least, that's what Louis keeps texting him every time he tells Louis he's five seconds away from running away and never coming back.

Since most teenage girls immediately read him as gay, Louis is attracting less attention from today's customers, so there's little point in him sticking around in the front of the shop. Zayn can handle running the register and Louis can cross some other tasks off his to-do list, including opening some recent book shipments and organizing them so they'll be ready to be put on the shelves on their respective release days.

Louis starts by opening all of the boxes, all of which are very heavy and have way more tape than he thinks is necessary. It takes him just to get the books out of the boxes, and that's when he has to begin the actual organization process in the back room. Louis has a bunch of shelves set up back there where they sort upcoming books by release date, author, and genre, and though it takes a while to get the initial sorting done, it greatly shortens the process of stocking the front of the shop.

ABBA is blasting in the back room while Louis organizes the upcoming releases on the shelves, and he's made it to the bottom shelf and is finishing arranging the upcoming releases by authors whose last names start with T when the unthinkable happens. Louis has been meaning to replace these old bookshelves for years, as he'd been gifted them from an old friend of his mother's when he first bought the shop, but he always forgets or finds an excuse to avoid spending the money. He regrets that procrastination today, however, when as he approaches the end of his organizing, the shelves begin to tip.

Every shelf of the bookcase has at least a hundred books on it, and there are enough shelves that the bookcase is taller than Louis even when he's standing. They're also made of metal, which means they're very heavy. And they're not secured to the wall despite the clear instructions that they should be. That was Louis' bad.

When the shelves start tipping, it's as though Louis is watching it happen in slow motion. He should try to do something to stop it, but he's so caught off guard that he can do nothing but watch as they slowly tilt toward him.

He closes his eyes, bracing for an impact that never comes.

When Louis finally dares to open his eyes, realizing that he's still alive and has no head trauma to speak of, he sees Harry standing there, one arm resting against the shelves, bicep bulging as he holds them in place. He caught them early enough that there's barely a book out of place, and relief courses through Louis' body immediately.

"You might want to step away from these shelves, sweetheart," Harry says, and Louis quickly scrambles away from the shelves.

When he's far enough away and it's clear that Harry has steadied them enough that they're not at any immediate risk of falling again, the demon turns back toward Louis and gives him a look.

"I have a little bad luck," Louis says with a shrug.

"No, I'm starting to think you actually just have a death wish," Harry says, frowning.

Louis ignores him and makes a mental note to ask Zayn to help him secure the shelves to the wall as soon as possible.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

The bookshop is open from 8AM to 8PM on Saturdays, as it's their longest work day of the week. They usually each take a short shift for only part of the day so they can all have some time to enjoy their weekend, but on this particular Saturday, Oli had plans to attend a family member's wedding and Zayn came down with a stomach bug, which leaves Louis to work the long shift entirely on his own. He's beyond exhausted by the time he makes it home, but he's also starving, so he puts some dinosaur chicken nuggets in the oven. They're an easy meal and quick to heat up, so it's the perfect solution.

He wanders into the living room while they're cooking and considers watching something on TV, but he doesn't even have enough energy to find the remote. Instead, he lays down on the couch and tries to rest his eyes for a few minutes, knowing that it won't be long until his nuggets are ready. As soon as he finishes dinner, he's putting on his pajamas and going straight to bed and sleeping through until morning, and he can't fucking wait.

Louis doesn't know if a minute passes or 30 minutes pass, but suddenly, there's a hand on his shoulder, shaking him awake.

"Wake up, Lou," Harry says, and Louis' eyes shoot open, panic immediately pooling in his gut. He's up from the couch and running toward the kitchen before Harry has a chance to say anything else, but once he gets there, he sees the oven smoking in a way that suggests there was a fire there recently, but it's already been put out. Louis presses a hand to his heart, which is beating wildly enough that he thinks his doctor would be concerned.

"You fell asleep while you were cooking dinner," Harry says with a frown, his arms crossed across his body. "The nuggets caught fire in the oven, but I put it out."

Louis knows he fucks up a lot—more so than usual, actually—but this could have seriously been a disaster. If Harry hadn't stepped in, he could have lost his house, and even more terrifyingly, his life.

"Thank you," Louis says sincerely, walking toward Harry and pulling him in for a hug. The demon might be an asshole most of the time, but he just saved Louis' life for real. Louis will forever be grateful to him for that.

When Louis pulls back from the hug, there's a look of surprise on Harry's face, and his arms are still out as if they're frozen in a hugging position. It's immediately clear to Louis that he hasn't been hugged in a very long time, if ever. Louis supposes he shouldn't be surprised by that considering the man lived a life that led to him becoming a demon in death. Louis may not know any of the details of Harry's life or death, but everybody needs a fucking hug sometimes.

He leans in for another one, pressing his body against Harry completely and taking a moment to enjoy how the demon smells. Louis isn't sure if hell smells like vanilla and smoke (the smoke part makes sense at least) or if that's just Harry's own distinct scent, but in just a couple of weeks, it's already become a comforting smell for Louis.

It takes a few more seconds, but eventually, Louis feels Harry relax into the hug and squeeze him back. He's strong and warm, and if Louis were honest with himself, he might even admit that this is the nicest hug he's experienced in quite a while.

But unfortunately for both of them, Louis isn't honest with himself.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Ever since his mom passed away, Louis prefers to visit the graveyard at dusk. He knows that's probably creepy to some people, but there's a quiet stillness that settles across the horizon at that hour, and something about it has always been so lovely to Louis. He'll usually come here every couple of weeks through most of the year with fresh flowers and just sit in front of her grave for an hour, telling his mom everything that's happening in his life and asking questions that she'll never have the chance to answer.

It might not be what a therapist recommends, but it's what works for Louis.

Going to the graveyard at dusk on this particular night, however, was probably not a wise decision. Another storm is brewing and thunder has been echoing in the distance for the past five minutes, but Louis only gets up to leave when the rain starts. It's just sprinkling for now, but the storm is moving closer, and Louis still has to walk the few blocks home.

He walks as briskly as he can through the graveyard, tears still clinging to his lashes, but he quickly realizes that he can't outpace this particular storm. Lightning cracks and Louis startles at how close the noise of it is, immediately picking up the pace. He feels like an idiot for being here right now, once again putting himself in harm's way accidentally, but he'd just wanted very desperately to visit his mom, and once he has that thought, it's impossible to ignore it.

Louis is just exiting the cemetery when another bolt of lightning strikes. Unfortunately for Louis, this time, it hits the branch of a tree just about 15 feet from where he's standing, and Louis watches in horror as the tree splits and begins to fall in his direction. He needs to move, get out of the way, do something, but he feels frozen in place with horror yet again. It's not just some shelves this time, it's an entire tree, and Louis is about to be crushed—

"Hello, there," Harry says suddenly as he appears with a pop, and then he's on Louis, shoving him roughly out of the way of the collapsing tree. Harry pushes Louis out of the way with such a level of force that it sends them both tumbling to the ground about ten feet from where the tree is falling, out of harm's way, and Harry maneuvers them easily as they fall so that it's his back and head that hit the ground, not Louis'. Louis lands on top of Harry in a messy heap, accidentally kneeing him in the balls in the process, and Harry groans even more in pain at that than at the force of his head and back hitting the ground.

The wind is knocked out of Louis when he fell, and when he finally catches his breath, he realizes that he's still on top of Harry.

"Can't say I haven't dreamt about this since I saw your ass in shorts the first day I was in your kitchen," the demon says with a smirk, gazing up at Louis with mirth in his eyes. Louis huffs and rolls off of him, even as the rain comes down more heavily around them now and the thunder booms. He makes sure to knee Harry in the balls a second time as he does.

"Are you supposed to talk to me like that?" Louis asks when Harry stops his overdramatic groaning. He's trying very hard to be disgusted instead of turned on, but he's not sure it's working, what with Harry saving him and his hair being all messy and his wet shirt showing every curve of his six-pack abs and all that. "You're supposed to be a guardian, not a catcaller."

Harry shrugs non-committally and gets up off the ground, reaching out a hand to help Louis up.

"Guardian demons aren't exactly the norm, so you get what you get," he says as Louis gets to his feet.

Louis can't argue with him there. Harry may have shown himself to Louis in a way his guardian angels never had, he may be rude, and he may say things he shouldn't, but he's saved Louis numerous times these past couple of weeks, and he's not even bad company most of the time. Louis knows he'd be dead by now without Harry's intervention, and he's grateful even if he doesn't always show it. Maybe Louis shouldn't have kneed him in the balls the second time.

"You've got to get home," Harry says with a frown, glancing at the sky around them, which is darkening more with each passing second as the storm rolls through.

He doesn't need to tell Louis twice, and they both set out toward Louis' home. It's only a couple of blocks, but the rain makes the journey feel significantly longer than usual. Louis' teeth are chattering and he knows he probably looks like a drowned rat, but Harry makes jokes the entire time, and it distracts him from how cold, wet, and tired he feels. When they reach Louis' door, Harry doesn't even bother to say goodbye before he's vanishing, just as impolite as ever, but when Louis gets in the shower to rinse off the mud and rain, he realizes that he'd started his journey crying and ended it laughing.

All because of Harry.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

It's like one second, Harry is popping up every time Louis is in danger (though admittedly, that's quite often), and the next, Harry's around a lot more than that. Louis can't be sure if Harry's starting to like him, albeit begrudgingly, or if it's just that Harry's bored now that his full-time job is being a guardian demon, which has a lot more downtime than the never-ending soul ushering that he did before. Louis is clumsy and gets into trouble and almost dies a lot, sure, but it's not literally every second of every day, which is how much time Harry would have been devoted to his previous task.

They eat dinner together sometimes, though Harry spends most of the time complaining about what Louis is choosing to eat or taking control of the meal that Louis is cooking to make something himself.

They go to the movies a few times, though only during the day when it's mostly empty so Louis can mutter his quiet commentary to Harry throughout without anyone assuming that he's talking to himself.

They hang out at the bookshop during Louis' shifts, usually when he's working solo shifts, but sometimes even when he's in the back room as long as Oli and Zayn are in the front.

As time passes, Harry starts to feel more like a friend than a demon watching Louis' every move.

Louis is not sure what to make of that.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis is not exactly known for his love of exercise, but he spends Sunday afternoon kicking around a soccer ball with Zayn and Oli and a couple of other people they know from around town. It goes pretty well for Louis, all things considered, and Harry only appears twice—once when Louis loses his balance on the uneven grass, and once when Zayn collides with Louis and almost knocks him over. It's probably not even necessary for Harry to help him because it's unlikely that he'd get any major injuries from either incident, but the demon shows up anyway.

He disappears as quickly as he appears, with only a quick whisper to Louis about how he's never liked playing soccer anyway—and an entirely inappropriate comment about Louis' ass in his soccer shorts, but that's neither here nor there.

By the time Louis arrives home, he's filthy, body and clothes both caked with mud and grass. He's happy though, walking with a spring in his step that he rarely gets these days. It was a fun day with good friends and great weather, and he enjoyed every minute of it. He really should do things like that more often.

Louis stuffs his dirty clothes in the hamper and walks to the shower, waiting patiently and humming to himself as the water warms up. When it's finally to the level of boiling hot that he personally prefers, he pushes the shower curtain out of the way and steps under the spray. There are few things that beat the feeling of hot water on your body, and Louis soaks it in, still humming a song that he heard on the radio on his way home. He's about to reach for the shampoo when he slips slightly on the wet porcelain beneath his feet. His eyes go wide as he tries to catch himself, and in the panic of falling, he reaches for the shower curtain to his right instead of the solid wall to his left.

Of course, the shower rod and curtain can't hold his weight, and both come crashing down as Louis feels himself falling alongside them.

"This is definitely my favorite save so far," Harry says cockily as he appears, reaching out and catching Louis with an arm around his waist. It's not all that different from how he prevented Louis from falling earlier during the soccer game, except that, well, this time Louis is completely fucking naked.

He steadies Louis easily, though Louis is still breathing heavily from the adrenaline. When he's sure that Louis has found his feet, the demon steps back and allows his eyes to move down the line of Louis' body appreciatively.

If Louis' cheeks are red, it's because of the hot water and nothing else.

"You're a pig," Louis says, yanking up the towel from the bathroom floor to cover himself.

"Demon, actually," Harry says with a salute. "By the way, I haven't been alive for a while, but I'm pretty sure that when you take a shower, you shouldn't be trying to boil yourself alive." Louis knew he'd comment on the high temperature of his water, and he feels vindicated now that Harry has proven him right. "If the water's too hot, I may become concerned that you're at risk and have to show up during your showers more often," Harry adds.

"Fuck off," Louis says, but Harry's already gone.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

On Friday night, Louis finds himself with his feet in Harry's lap as they watch a documentary about serial killers.

"I fucking love welcoming people like this to hell," Harry says angrily as he watches one of the killers on screen explaining how they chose their victims. "Sick fucks. There was nothing better than knowing that I was welcoming them into a place where they'd be suffering for all of eternity with no escape. I'd slam the door closed behind them when they went."

Louis knows it's probably not the norm for guardian angels or demons to be hanging out so casually with the person they're sworn to protect, but lately, it's become so for Louis and Harry. Though he's probably a little meaner and more sarcastic than Louis' regular friends, the casual friendship they've developed has made it easy for Louis to forget who Harry really is and what he really does. It doesn't help that Harry's always in his human form either—though he has confirmed for Louis that he has horns when he's not.

From Louis' understanding, Harry's position first as someone ushering souls into hell and now as a guardian demon suggests that he has not been allowed into either heaven or hell, and is instead caught in purgatory, an in-between state where it will eventually be determined whether he will remain a demon and move to hell for the rest of time, or if he has enough redeeming qualities to become an angel and be moved to heaven.

Though he was a little frightened to hear the answer, Louis asked Harry one day how ended up becoming a demon instead of an angel.

"It's not as straightforward as you might think," Harry had told him with a shrug. "Not every demon was some murderer or abuser in real life, and not every angel was a perfect person who did no wrong. We all fall somewhere on a spectrum, and they make the best determination that they can. It's more difficult for some than it is for others, and in that case, they temporarily categorize you as either a demon or an angel and they put you to work until they decide where you'll end up. So one day, when I'm done guarding you or done ushering horrible people into hell, they'll make that determination for me as well."

Harry also admitted that he doesn't remember much about his human life. "I wasn't a horrible criminal or anything like that," he'd said on the night that Louis asked. "But I remember being very selfish, and sometimes a little cruel. I hurt a lot of people, unintentionally most of the time, but I should have known better—I should have been better. If I could go back—if I had a second chance and could do everything over again, I would do things differently, but I can't. All I can do is make the most of the situation I'm in now and hope that maybe I'll have redeemed myself enough by the time they make my final determination."

Even now, as they watch this show, Louis can see the evidence plain as day that Harry is not truly bad. He's a demon and Louis was he's a little rude and yeah, Louis wants to punch him in the dick half the time, but Louis feels certain that he's not the same as he was when he was human. He's learned and grown and become better. He's something different now, and Louis believes that if he can see it, the powers that be up will see it too. Louis wants that for him, and he knows Harry deserves it.

As Louis focuses his attention back on the documentary, he notices that there's a different serial killer on the screen now. He's describing in horrifying detail what he did to some of his victims, and it's at that moment that Louis' stomach decides to rumble.shs

Harry laughs. "Aww, hungry, princess?" He asks, and Louis jabs him in the stomach with his foot.

"I think I have a Snickers bar on top of my dresser in my room," Louis says while doing his best impression of puppy dog eyes. "Can you please grab it for me?"

Harry rolls his eyes. "I'm your guardian demon, not your servant," he says.

"Protect me from my hunger, then," Louis says, flinging an arm over his face dramatically. "I'm wasting away and it's up to you to save me." 

After several seconds of silence, Louis opens one eye and peeks out from behind his arm. Harry's still sitting there and staring at him, looking very unamused.

"Please?" Louis asks sweetly.

Harry mumbles some insults to himself, but he moves Louis' feet off his lap a few seconds later and gets up.

Louis fist pumps at his own success and then refocuses his attention on the documentary. It's engrossing enough that it takes him until his stomach growls again to realize that Harry hasn't yet returned with his snickers bar, which only should have taken a minute or so to fetch. If he ate it himself like he tried to eat Louis' grilled cheese on the first day they met, Louis is going to murder him and be sent straight to hell himself.

"Harry?" Louis asks, getting up off the couch and walking toward his bedroom. "Where are you?"

When he reaches his bedroom, he finds Harry there, sitting on the floor cross-legged. He's looking through something, a book of some kind, and it only takes a second for Louis to identify what book it is. His blood runs cold. He can do nothing but stand there silently as Harry gets to his feet, slamming the book closed and dangling it in front of Louis' face angrily.

"What the fuck is this?" Harry asks harshly, and yeah, Louis remembers quite easily that he's a demon right now.

Louis shrugs and turns, the blood rushing loudly in his ears. "I don't know, some old book. I own a bookshop. Why does it matter?"

Harry grabs Louis' shoulder forcefully and spins him back around so he's facing the demon once again.

"This is a goddamn spellbook, Louis," Harry says, anger dripping from his voice.

Louis doesn't say anything.

"Fuck," Harry says, laughing bitterly. "This explains so much about you and your life. I don't have a lot of experience with magical beings outside of death, but I've seen some of them passing through in one direction or the other. I know they exist on earth, even if regular humans generally aren't aware of their presence while they're here."

Louis shoves Harry's hand off his shoulder and storms out of the room.

"You're a fucking witch, Louis," Harry yells from behind him. "And I'd love to know why you're pretending you're not."

Louis doesn't answer and doesn't stop walking until he's in the living room, where he sits back down on the couch.

He doesn't actually hear the pop, but he's not surprised when Harry doesn't rejoin him.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis hasn't seen Harry in days. To be fair, he hasn't experienced any serious crises that would require Harry's intervention, but there have been a few scrapes and bruises that Harry usually would have stepped in to prevent. Louis is getting the silent treatment from his own damn guardian demon, and that just doesn't seem fair.

He decides to go out with Oli and Zayn that weekend to take his mind off things. It's been a long time since Louis went out to a bar and got drunk and forgot himself for a little while, and it seems like something that's long overdue.

Oli and Zayn both take Ubers to the bar they decide to go to, but Louis drives himself, if only to stop himself from drinking too much and almost dying. He's not sure if Harry would step in even if something really serious were to happen right now, that's how angry it seems that Harry is with him, so it's better to be cautious than to end up dead.

Louis has two drinks early in the night, which gets him tipsy enough to be able to dance with his best friends without second-guessing his every move. They're all having an amazing time, laughing and dancing and exchanging gossip like they used to when they first became friends years ago. A few men approach Louis and offer to buy him drinks, and one particularly bold man asks if Louis would be willing to go home with him, but Louis feels too weird to take any of them up on the offer.

Maybe it would serve Harry right to have to watch from the shadows while Louis gets railed six ways to Sunday after he's ignored Louis for so long, but something inside Louis won't allow him to go through with that. He knows that he'd just be thinking about Harry the entire time, and that would not be fun for anyone involved, least of all Louis himself.

By the time the night comes to a close, the effects of Louis' drinks have worn off. He waits with Zayn and Oli as they wait for their Ubers, leaning on Zayn for support and warmth as they experience the relentless chilly late autumn breeze.

Once they've both gotten in the cars safely, Louis waves them goodbye with a smile and sets off down the street in pursuit of his car, which he parked just around the car from the bar they went to. Louis starts to hum the last Rihanna song they played in the bar before they left, letting himself sway slightly to the beat as he walks, rubbing his hands up and down his own arms for warmth.

He's just about 20 feet from his car when someone jumps out in front of him.

Louis jumps back immediately, mouth dropping open in shock, but no sound escapes his mouth. There's a short, dark-haired man standing in front of him who reeks of liquor, and in his hand is a knife. Not a butter knife, or even a pocket knife, but a serious knife. One that could kill you with little effort from the person holding it.

"Give me your wallet," the man spits out, and Louis quickly fumbles in his back pocket for his wallet.

"I don't really have anything on me," Louis says quickly. He always empties his wallet of everything but the essentials before a night out, so all he has left in there is probably his license and one credit card. He knows that's probably not what the man wants to hear, but it's the truth, and he'll be finding it out soon enough anyway.

Louis holds his hand with his wallet out, nausea churning in his gut, and the man immediately snatches it and flips through it. He's not pleased by the lack of cash or gift cards or credit cards, Louis can tell, and that's when the man lunges forward with the knife and holds it right up against Louis' throat.

Or at least, he tries to. Before he can get within a few inches of Louis' neck, Harry's appeared with a pop, and Louis watches on with horror as Harry easily overpowers the man and turns the knife back toward his own neck. The man can't see Harry and has no idea what's happening to him, and you can practically smell the fear radiating off of him from how quickly the situation turned. Harry continues pushing the knife toward the man's neck, inching closer and closer, until Louis cries out.

"Harry, stop!" He says, grasping onto Harry's arm and pulling him back. Harry doesn't go at first, too strong to move just because Louis wants him to, but when Louis repeats himself, Harry finally drops the knife and takes a step back. When Louis glances at his face, he sees nothing but pure, uncontrolled rage on his face, and yeah. It's another stark reminder of what Harry is.

The man runs for his life almost immediately, but both Louis and Harry stand there in silence for a few minutes, staring after him even after he's disappeared from sight. Louis has no idea what to say to break the tense silence between them and is considering mentioning the weather—a desperate last resort—when Harry reaches out and grabs Louis' hand without saying a word.

"Let's get you home," he says gruffly, guiding Louis gently toward his car.

Harry doesn't let go of Louis' hand until they're pulling into Louis' driveway.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Of course, the cat is on Louis' porch when they arrive home.

When Louis unlocks his door and enters his house, he leaves the door open behind him, even at the risk of the cat entering. He's uncertain for a moment whether Harry will follow him or not, but he hears footsteps behind him and allows himself a small, private smile when the door closes with Harry on this side of it.

Louis turns around to face his demon. It's the first time since they've met that Harry looks uncomfortable, and Louis hates everything about it. Harry's meant to be cocky and sure of himself in every room he walks into, and Louis knows that he's not like that right now because of him. He'd do anything to fix that, so he does the first thing that comes to mind.

He moves forward and kisses Harry.

Harry doesn't respond at first, and when Louis pulls back, he can see nothing but shock etched onto Harry's face. He doesn't look displeased, however, so Louis decides to give it one more try. This time, Harry is ready for it and responds in kind, kissing Louis back with a more gentle version of the fierce passion that he saw on display earlier tonight.

Harry walks Louis back into the wall and hoists him up, Louis' legs immediately wrapping around his back as his arms wind around his shoulders. It's not long before Louis' groin starts feeling the friction, and Louis can't help but whimper at the feeling. He's getting hard, and he can feel that Harry is too. The question is what Harry's willing to do about it.

"I want you to fuck me," Louis whispers against Harry's mouth, and he hears Harry bang a fist on the wall behind him.

They kiss again, but it's not long before Harry breaks it. "You sure?" He asks before kissing along Louis' neck.

Louis nods. He's never been more sure of anything in his life. He wants this, has for a long time, and tonight, he's finally making it happen.

Harry doesn't need any further demands. He kisses Louis again, and without breaking it, he walks Louis upstairs, never once stumbling or making Louis feel like he's about to be dropped. Louis isn't sure if that's a demon thing or a Harry thing, but either way, it's very sexy, and if Harry doesn't get inside Louis in the next ten minutes, he's going to do something drastic. 

Harry puts Louis down on the bed gently, but Louis is too impatient for all that.

"Off, off," Louis says frantically, yanking at his own clothes. Harry follows his lead and starts pulling off his shirt, his jeans, and the ugly red sneakers that he always loves to wear. Louis blinks and Harry's naked in front of him, and he can't even pretend that his eyes don't immediately drop below Harry's hips. "Well, fuck me," Louis says, eyes wide.

"Yeah, that's kinda the point," Harry says with a roll of his eyes, and Louis doesn't have time to be scared of that monster before Harry is pushing him back on the bed and covering Louis' naked body with his own. They fit together, is the thing, and it's never been more clear than it is at this moment, just skin on skin in Louis' bed.

Harry kisses Louis so deeply while he fingers him open that it's hard for Louis to even be nervous about what's to come. It's been a while since Louis slept with anybody, and he's never slept with anyone as big as Harry, so he knows the start of this endeavor is probably not going to be the most comfortable for him. It doesn't make him want it any less though.

Harry has three fingers inside of him and is kissing around Louis' belly button when Louis tells him he's ready.

When Harry's eyes meet his, lips still hovering over Louis' soft stomach, Louis nods as confirmation.

"Okay, baby," Harry says. It goes without saying that a demon can't carry an STD, so neither Harry nor Louis bother mentioning or reaching for condoms. Harry just turns Louis onto his side, spoons up behind him, and slides in slowly. Louis grits his teeth through the discomfort and Harry kisses his shoulder with every inch. Once he's entirely sheathed inside Louis' body, Louis takes a deep breath and Harry awaits his confirmation that he's good to keep moving.

It doesn't take long for Louis to provide that confirmation.

As long as Louis has known this demon, he hasn't known Harry to take much seriously. He keeps Louis safe, absolutely, but he does so with a lot of jokes and sarcastic comments along the way. This, though? It's not like that at all.

When Harry fucks, he's deadly serious.

It's only a few seconds before he finds Louis' prostate, and immediately, all of the discomfort Louis was feeling fades into pure bliss. Louis moans loudly enough that he thinks his neighbors can probably hear him, and he doesn't care in the slightest. Harry is hitting it on every thrust, filling him so completely that it's all-consuming. There is no room in Louis' heart or brain to think of anything except Harry's body behind him and on top of him and inside him.

When they come, they come together, Harry's lips panting in Louis' ear and Louis' whimpers filling the quiet room.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Once they're both cleaned up, they don't sleep. They lie together on the bed in silence, Louis' head on Harry's chest.

There is a secret still lying between them, only half exposed, and Louis knows he needs to tell the truth. Harry deserves that from him, after all he's done, and after all they've been through together. It's time for Louis to finally come clean.

"My mom was a witch too," Louis finally says into the silence. Harry tenses beneath him, but says nothing. Louis knows he's not surprised by her words, but likely just be the fact that she's finally saying them out loud. "She taught me everything I knew about being a witch ever since I showed magical abilities. I think I was about three years old at the time. And for all those years, it was just me and her and our magic, and that was all we ever needed."

Harry kisses the top of Louis' head while he speaks.

"About a year after I moved out of the house and got my own place, she was diagnosed with cancer. She went through treatment for a while, but it advanced to stage four very quickly, and it wasn't long until the doctors told her there was nothing they could do except to keep her comfortable. I was spending more time at her place than mine, at that point, just trying to soak up every second with her that I could. She asked me to go out one day to get these blueberry scones. I was the one who had always been obsessed with them, so I should have suspected something when she asked, but I didn't."

Louis looks at Harry, who is looking down at him with sad eyes.

"She got me out of the house so she could try to do a spell to undo the cancer, to make her go back to how she'd been before. It backfired badly. There was an explosion, and both she and her entire house were turned to ash before anybody could do anything about it. I left for an hour to pick up some scones, and when I came back, my mom was gone forever," Louis whispers. He pushes himself up off Harry's chest and sits back against the headboard, and Harry immediately follows suit.

"Where was her guardian angel, I wonder?" Louis asks. "Magic cost me the only person I had. And I haven't done it since."

Harry sighs and reaches for Louis' hand.

"I am so sorry that happened to you, Louis. But you have to know..." He trails off.

"Don't," Louis says. He doesn't know what Harry was about to say, but he knows he doesn't want to hear it.

"You can't cheat death, Louis. You can only bargain with her. And when your fate is set, when it's truly set, there is not a damn thing you can do to change that. Your mother knew that when she cast that spell. All witches do," Harry says.

“Don't you fucking dare blame my mother for her death, Harry,” Louis says angrily.

Harry shakes his head and pulls Louis' hand to his mouth, kissing it gently.

“I’m not passing judgment or assigning blame," Harry tells him. "Your mother loved you and didn't want to leave you behind. I cannot begrudge her that. I would probably do the same thing if I was in that situation. I’m just saying that she knew the risk when she did that spell. She betrayed her magic, and so her magic betrayed her. And now you are doing the same thing.”

Louis swallows hard.

"You are betraying your magic by denying its presence, and so it's fighting back," Harry says, and Louis knows the truth of his words even as a tiny voice in his brain tries to deny it. "Every time you get hurt, every time you end up in a near-death situation, it's your magic pushing you to use it. You know this, and yet you still refuse to. And one day, your magic will win this battle against you, just as it won against your mother, and you will be lost just as she was."

A single tear drips down Louis' cheek. He moves his hand up to wipe it away, but Harry beats him to it. He holds Louis' face in his hands and makes sure Louis is looking him in the eye as he says the next few words.

"Your magic is a part of you, Louis. And it always will be. You have to accept that."

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis wakes curled up with Harry the next morning, and it's hard to wipe the smiles off their faces when they look at each other.

Harry makes Louis bacon, eggs, and toast while dressed in only boxers, a massive and delicious breakfast that Louis would normally only expect if he was going out to a restaurant to eat. They don't talk about Louis' magic or Louis' mother, but when Louis nearly burns himself on the stove and Harry pulls him back at the last minute, he gives Louis a look.

Time is running out for Louis to live like this, and they both know it.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

It's chilly outside, but Louis wants ice cream and Harry is the most whipped demon that has ever exited, so they go to get ice cream. Harry decides not to get any so they can sit outside at a table while they eat without getting any stares from passersby due to floating spoons and all that. It's a perfect day, sunny and bright despite the chill.

Louis and Harry are talking about something, and later, Louis won't even be able to remember what it is if you were to ask. It's something inconsequential, but they're both smiling, unable to keep their eyes off of one another.

And then Louis reaches across the table and intertwines his hand with Harry's.

They've held hands so many times by now that it shouldn't be a big deal, but Louis sees Harry's entire expression change. He's looking at Louis with pure adoration in his eyes one second, and Louis knows his eyes are reflecting the same thing. Harry seems to come to some startling realization then, however, and he pulls his hand back as though he's been burned.

"Louis," Harry says, and for the first time since Louis' met him, he sounds scared.

Louis frowns in confusion.

"Louis, my powers are gone," Harry says frantically, and that's when Louis hears it. A crash in the distance, and then the easily identifiable sound of a vehicle careening out of control, moving far faster than it should be down a busy street lined with people. People like Louis and Harry, who are both sitting at a table in front of a small ice cream shop, just feet from the street.

Louis looks over and sees a truck, and it only takes him half a second to realize that it's headed right toward them.

“Harry,” Louis says desperately, and he can hear how heavy his own breathing is.

He has just seconds to act, and if he doesn't, this is it for him. This is the end.

He looks over at Harry one more time and sees the look of horror on his face, and Louis doesn't want that to be the last thing he sees. He can't let that be the last thing he sees.

So Louis closes his eyes and summons his magic.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Everything is a blur after that. The police come, Louis knows. He remembers the flashing lights, remembers the questions, remembers the colors of their uniforms. He knows that he files a police report and his guardian demon, now powerless, stays by his side the entire time, though, of course, nobody can see him except Louis.

For the first time since Louis met him, it doesn't feel like enough.

When they get back to Louis' place, Harry makes them both some tea and they settle down at the kitchen table.

Harry looks absolutely wrecked, eyes damp and mouth downturned, but Louis doesn't understand what any of this means. He doesn't understand what happened back there, but he can still feel magic bursting beneath his skin. It's overwhelming and exhausting at the same time, having that feeling after he spent so many years repressing it. It's too much.

"Can you please tell me what just happened?" Louis asks finally, breaking the silence as he wraps both hands around his mug. He doesn't look at Harry as he asks it.

Harry sighs and runs his fingers through his hair, more frustrated and out of sorts than Louis has ever seen him. After these couple of months of smug Harry, cocky Harry, amused Harry, protective Harry, and even caring Harry, Louis has never seen him on edge like this, like he's breaking apart before Louis' very eyes.

“I broke the most important rule that every guardian must follow," Harry says finally, meeting Louis' eyes. "I fell in love with you."

Louis feels his heart skitter to a stop before it kicks up several notches, thumping wildly in his chest.

"I love you too, Harry," Louis says immediately, reaching across the table to grab Harry's hand, but the demon moves away before he can reach him. Louis halts his movement immediately, his arm resting awkwardly where it's sprawled across the table.

Harry gets up, and Louis doesn't like where this is going.

"I can't stay," Harry says, steel in his voice. "I can't be your guardian anymore, and they're calling me back."

Louis feels his heart shatter in his ribcage. "No," Louis says, giving a laugh that's slightly hysterical. After all that's happened today, it's now that the tears finally start. "No, Harry, if you go now, then that means—"

He cuts himself off. He can't even say it.

He'll never see Harry again. He only sees Harry now because he's his guardian demon, and if Harry's not that anymore, then he disappears from Louis' life forever. He'll never again step in to protect Louis, never again tease him, never again make him cry, laugh, or yell. It'll be over, just as quickly as it began, and Louis will have to live the rest of his life without him.

"I'm so sorry," Harry says, and when Louis looks at him, he can see the devastation written all over his face.

Louis gets up from the table and throws himself onto Harry, clutching him as tightly as he can. He tries to take Harry in with all of his senses, tries to force his brain to memorize it all because he knows that this is the last time he'll ever feel this, smell this, touch this. He'll never have the chance again, and the memories will be all that's left. Just like it was with his mother.

Harry holds him back just as tightly, and Louis' face is pressed up against his chest, but he feels Harry's body shake just slightly, as if he too is crying.

"I love you, I love you, I love you," Louis says against him, just as the arms around him disappear.

When Louis opens his eyes, he's alone.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis calls out of work for two weeks straight. He spends most of that time in a blanket cocoon in his bed, his pillowcase damp with tears beneath his head. He has his groceries delivered to his house and eats few of them, barely able to drag himself to the bathroom most days, let alone the kitchen. It feels like his ribs have cracked under the weight of his heavy heart, but there's nothing to be done about it.

Louis hasn't felt like this since his mother died, hasn't really allowed himself to get close enough to anybody that it could even be a possibility. Now he remembers why that is.

Of course, underneath the sadness and heartbreak, there is a profound sense of loss. Louis just misses Harry. He misses the way the smirk would spread across his face when he was about to say something rude, which was pretty much every other second. He misses the way Harry would talk softly to Louis as if to prevent anyone from overhearing even when that was an impossibility. He misses the way Harry would complain and sing to himself while he cooked. He misses the way Harry's scent would linger on his clothes after he disappeared, like a promise of his return. He misses the way Harry would laugh when they teased each other. He misses the way Harry would tell him the truth even when it hurt to hear, even when Louis told him to stop, even when Louis knew it too but was too afraid to admit it to himself.

He can admit it all to himself now.

Louis doesn't use his magic much over those two weeks, but he feels the same buzzing in his fingertips that he felt when he first realized his abilities back when he was too young to understand what it all meant. Pandora's box has been opened, and there's no closing it again, even if Louis wanted to. He's a witch, knows it deep in his bones just as he always did, but now he's willing to acknowledge it on the surface too, something he hasn't done in so long.

Harry had said that magic is a part of Louis, and he was right.

After the two-week mark passes, Louis forces himself out of bed, dresses in old sweatpants and a t-shirt that smells like Harry, and drives himself to the bookshop. Oli and Zayn have been true friends, not once questioning Louis even as they had to double up shifts to keep the bookshop open during its regular hours without Louis' assistance, and he'll forever be grateful to them for that. They asked no questions when Louis texted them that he was not going to be able to come in for a little while; instead, they did their part to keep his business running without complaint. Louis chose right with those two, he knows.

Louis arrives at the bookshop first and unlocks the door before stepping inside. He takes a deep breath, inhaling the familiar scent of coffee and paper and dust that he loves so much. After glancing around, he can tell that restocks have not been going as smoothly as they would be if he hadn't abandoned ship for two weeks, but otherwise, everything seems to be in order. Louis rubs his hand across the counter and closes his eyes, wishing more than anything that when he opens them, Harry will be there, standing in front of him just like he used to.

Of course, he isn't. Louis' chest aches, but he grits his teeth through it.

Zayn and Oli enter together just a few minutes later, both having pulled up next to each other in the lot behind the row of shops the bookshop is part of. When they see him, their faces transition from shock to happiness immediately, and they quickly move in to wrap Louis in their arms. Louis had texted him that he'd be in today and asked them both to show up, but it's clear they were still uncertain after so many days without him.

The hug from them both lasts a long time, and it makes him feel warm in a way that he hasn't since he last felt Harry's hands on him. Over these years without his mother and now these weeks without Harry, it's been too easy for Louis to forget that he still has Zayn and Oli, his two best friends in the world. They've become his chosen family, really, sticking by him through thick and thin, and he knows that he will need to start allowing himself to lean on them more if he's going to make it through.

In fact, that's part of the reason why he's doing this.

"So," Zayn says finally, leaning on the checkout counter with one elbow and resting his chin on his hand. He does not continue his sentence.

Oli squeezes Louis' elbow gently and goes over to stand with Zayn, shoving both hands into his pockets and watching Louis silently as they wait for him to speak.

Louis knows they're expecting some kind of explanation, but he's certain they're not expecting the one they're actually about to get.

"There's something I need to tell you guys. Or, well, I guess, it's more something I need to show you," Louis says slowly, watching his friends' faces to gauge their reactions. Zayn glances at Oli, slightly confused, but then he turns back to Louis and gives him an encouraging smile.

"Bro, you know we're here for you no matter what. You can tell us—or show us—anything," he says. 

Louis closes his eyes and takes a deep breath before reopening them. When he does, he raises his hand toward the plants in the window of the bookshop, all of which have seen better days. Not that Louis was taking particularly good care of them before—he wouldn't exactly say that he has a green thumb, as you can probably guess—but with how busy Oli and Zayn have been holding down the shop while Louis was out, watering and caring for the plants has clearly been low down on their to-do lists. As a result, their leaves are mostly brown and shriveled, likely unsalvagable.

Not for Louis though. He mutters some words under his breath, an old spell that his mother used to use often (he takes after her in terms of his plant-caring ability, of course). He can see out of his peripheral vision that Oli and Zayn are both following the line of his hand with their gaze. With a flick of his fingers, the plants' leaves thicken back up, what is brown turns green again, and the plants come back to life before their eyes.

Oli gasps out loud, hand clutching his heart, and while Zayn is watching silently, shock registering on his face.

There's a bookshelf by the door that has been crooked since a little kid ran into it half a year ago, and Louis has been meaning to fix it ever since. He hadn't gotten around to it until now, as he flicks his fingers again in its direction, muttering another incantation quietly and watching as the right side of the shelf lifts to meet the left, the shelf perfectly aligned once more.

"What the fuck," Zayn says quietly, but there's awe in his voice, not fear or disgust. Louis grins at him.

"Anyone want coffee?" Louis asks. He doesn't give them time to answer before three steaming cups appear on the counter in front of them.

Zayn and Oli are both gaping, and they reach for the mugs at the same time as if trying to check if they're real. They are, of course, and though Louis can't attest to how good the coffee will taste, at least he knows that it is indeed coffee and it is indeed hot, as if the steam wasn't giveaway enough.

"I guess it's as good of a time as any to tell you that I'm a witch," Louis says with a small smile.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

Louis leaves the bookshop that day with a pep in his step that he hasn't had in a while. Most of the groceries he's had delivered over the past couple of weeks have gone bad, so Louis decides to make use of his good mood and be productive by stopping by the grocery store and picking up a few things. He tries not to buy anything that reminds him too much of Harry, instead sticking to basics like bread and soup and frozen meals, but it's good enough. Small steps are all he can manage right now, but he knows there's no shame in that.

Louis is making his way through the store with his cart half-full, intent on checking out, when he sees the pet aisle out of the corner of his eye.

His feet to come to a stop without his consent, and Louis stares at the shelves of pet food and lets out a heavy sigh.

When he finally does check out fifteen minutes later, his cart is full to the rim with cat food, treats, toys, bowls, and even a bed that Louis would be willing to curl up on himself.

As he loads the items into his car, he can't help but laugh at himself. He supposes he was fighting a losing battle with that witchy little cat all along.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️

The doorbell startles Louis from his nap. He's been curled up on the couch for hours beneath a fuzzy blanket that used to belong to his mom, and what started as a Game Of Thrones marathon quickly devolved into a lazy afternoon where Louis drifted in and out of sleep as the TV played quietly in the background.

It's rare that anybody rings Louis' doorbell, so he waits for the noise to sound again to make sure he didn't just imagine it.

When it does, Louis finally wiggles his way out of the blanket, nearly tripping as he untangles himself, and pads his way over to the door barefoot.

He should probably double-check who it is before he opens the door just in case it's someone from the FBI's most wanted list—because yes, Louis does review that periodically—but his brain hasn't completely caught onto the fact that he's awake, so instead, he throws the door open without a second thought.

When he sees Harry standing there, his mouth drops open.

"Honey, I'm home," Harry says with a smile, and Louis can't help it—he immediately starts crying.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Louis asks, gesturing for Harry to come inside and immediately touching his chest to make sure that he's real. Every nerve ending in Louis' body feels like it's on fire as he tries to figure out how to process the fact that this demon—his demon—is standing here again when Louis was so certain they'd never see each other again.

“I bargained,” Harry says simply, shrugging his shoulders.

Louis remembers their conversation that night. You can't cheat death, you can only bargain with her.

"What do you mean?" Louis says breathlessly, but he thinks he already knows.

"I was given a second chance to come back here and be with you. It took a while, but I fought for it and I won. I'm here, I'm real, I'm—I'm never going to leave you again, not until we're old and wrinkled and lying peacefully in our bed together with our full, amazing, happy lives behind us. I promise you, Louis."

There are still tears dripping down Louis' face, but he leans in anyway, unable to help himself. Harry meets him halfway, kissing him fully and licking into his mouth, holding nothing back. At least that, in this new, actual human form, has not changed.

Louis pulls back after a moment. "So like, if I called Zayn or Oli and had them come over, they would actually see you?”

"Yes," Harry says, a wicked grin on his face as he tugs Louis in by his belt loops. “But I’d really rather you didn’t have anyone come over right now, if that's okay.”

Louis kisses him again, relief coursing through his body. He never thought he'd get to feel this again, and it almost feels too good to be true.

"By the way," Harry says, murmuring the words against Louis' lips. "While I was there, I found out why you were assigned a guardian angel in the first place—or, more accurately, multiple guardian angels and a guardian demon."

Louis frowns and looks up at Harry. "Why?"

He asks. A sad smile comes across Harry's face, and he doesn't even have to say the words because the realization comes to Louis immediately.

"My mom," Louis whispers. "Of course."

"She's always been with you," Harry says quietly, his thumb gently wiping the tears from Louis' cheeks. "She always will be."

Louis closes his eyes and feels Harry press their foreheads together as they just breathe each other in again. Harry still smells the way he always did, Louis realizes with relief. The smoke and vanilla are just him, not anything else, and now Louis is going to get to smell it for the rest of his damn life. It's everything he never dared to hope for, but he has it now.

Harry kisses Louis again, more deeply this time, and that's the exact moment that a certain cat decides to make his presence known by meowing loudly from the doorway. Immediately, Louis and Harry refocus their attention in the cat's direction, and a smile spreads across Harry's face at the sight before he looks at Louis knowingly.

"Don't say a word," Louis says, rolling his eyes.

Harry holds his hands up defensively. "Wouldn't dream of it, darling," he says with barely contained mirth. "Just wanted to ask what his name is."

Louis looks over at the cat, who is watching them both knowingly. Louis isn't sure what, exactly, it knows, but he's sure that whatever it is, it's bad news for them both.

"Joe," he answers shortly, taking a step back from Harry.

"Joe," Harry repeats, looking between the black cat and Louis skeptically. "That's not a very witchy name."

"He tried to bully me into embracing my magic again," Louis says, crossing his arms and glaring down at the cat. "In my opinion, that's crossing a line. He doesn't deserve a witchy name."

Harry just looks at Louis with one eyebrow raised, and Louis tries to hold the eye contact for as long as he can, but he has allergies and he's been napping on and off for hours and the love of his life is standing in front of him again, so it's not long before his eyes start watering. As soon as he blinks, a clear admission of defeat, he looks down at the cat and immediately feels the heavy weight of judgment behind those bright yellow eyes.

"Fine, whatever, his real name is Spook," Louis admits, rolling his eyes when Spook wraps himself around Louis' ankle in response and starts purring.

Harry smiles and takes a step closer to Louis, leaning down to kiss him again.

"We're going to make the happiest little family, aren't we, Spook?" He asks when he pulls away, glancing down at the cat. Spook just looks up at Harry and hisses before scampering off, likely off to go throw up another hairball onto the clothes laying on the floor of Louis' closet that he meant to hang up two months ago.

"So bitchy. Like mother, like son," Harry says with an offended huff, and Louis smacks him on the shoulder for that comment.

Louis has a lot to say to Harry in response to that rude implication, he really does, but then Harry is picking him up bridal style and carrying him to the bedroom, and he loses his train of thought. When Harry drops him unceremoniously on the bed, Louis lands with an "oof" and immediately fixes his fringe, unworried about his body sprawled out the covers. Harry is gazing at him in a way that Louis knows would make Oli and Zayn both roll their eyes or gag, but for Louis, it feels like it sets off a wave of butterflies fluttering in his chest.

"I love you," Harry says. "And I'm the luckiest man in the world."

The way Harry's looking at Louis makes him feel raw and exposed in the best way, but there's still an undercurrent of shyness that overwhelms Louis' senses.

"Luckiest demon, you mean," Louis says, his cheeks heating up as he tries to distract Harry from the true depth of his words.

"Demon-turned-man," Harry corrects as he pulls his shirt over his head. When his face is visible again, he gives Louis a look like he knows exactly what Louis is doing, but he'll let him do it anyway.

"Man-turned-demon-turned-man again," Louis amends, yanking his own shirt off and tossing it aside.

"Which suggests my first statement about how I'm a man still stands, doesn't it?" Harry asks as he tugs off his socks.

"I called you 'demon thing' in my head a few times," Louis confesses while he slides his sweatpants down his legs.

Harry's in nothing but his boxer briefs now, and he lowers himself on top of Louis on the bed, caging him in. "I call you a lot of things in my head," he says thoughtfully, moving his lips down the side of Louis' neck as he squirms.

"Such as?" Louis asks, gasping as Harry pushes their hips together.

Harry sucks on Louis' earlobe and hums. "Brat," he says in response. "My little witch. Bane of my existence. Baby, sometimes, and princess other times. Pain in the ass. Annoying, accident-prone, someone with a death wish, a full-time job, the worst thing that's ever happened to me, and the best. Love of my life, more recently, and—"

"Alright, alright, I get it," Louis says, sealing their mouths together and wrapping his arms around Harry's shoulders.

There's nothing like the feeling of Harry on top of him again, and Louis lets himself soak it in. Though Harry's supporting much of his weight on his elbows, Louis still feels the pressure of his body where it really counts, and Harry's hands are cupping Louis' jaw as they kiss. Louis moves his hands over Harry's broad shoulders, muscles rippling beneath his fingertips as he tries to hold back the whimper threatening to escape from his throat.

"Let me hear you, baby," Harry murmurs into Louis' mouth, grinding his hips down into Louis' again with only the fabric of their underwear between them.

"Fuck, Harry, please," Louis moans, pushing up against Harry's cock, which he can feel easily pressing up against him, thick and hard and everything Louis has been missing these past few weeks.

It's evident that Harry has been just as impatient as Louis, as he doesn't need to be told twice before he's lifting his weight off of Louis just long enough to pull off his own underwear. Louis reaches down to rid himself of the offending undergarments so they can finally be fully skin-on-skin, but he doesn't have the chance before Harry is flipping him onto his stomach.

"God, I missed this," Harry whispers in awe as Louis turns his head to look at him over his shoulder. "You're perfect."

Louis bites his lips and tries to stop himself from pushing his hips down against the bed for some friction. "Harry," he pleads. He doesn't even know what he's begging for at this point, he just knows he needs more.

Only half a second passes before Louis feels Harry's breath on his lower back, and Louis can't help but let out a gasp when he feels Harry whisper "up" against his skin.

He lifts his hips as requested, and only a beat passes before he feels Harry bite down on the top of his underwear, pulling them down his ass and thighs with nothing but his teeth. Louis moans when his cock pops free, and the tears are officially flowing down his cheeks by the time Harry tugs the fabric off his legs completely and throws them off the bed.

"Yeah," Harry says quietly when Louis is completely naked, his hands pulling Louis' cheeks apart. "This is what I've been missing."

Louis buries his face in his pillow, and as soon as Harry flattens his tongue against his hole, he bites down. Louis pushes back into Harry's face as he dives in, licking in as he spreads Louis out. He sucks at Louis' rim as he squirms unceremoniously below him, unable to keep still as he's overwhelmed with the feeling.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, definitely still a demon," Louis pants out, unable to help the drool that's now pooling on his pillow.

He hears Harry laugh behind him before he resumes his efforts, but only a few seconds pass before Harry gasps and pulls back with a start.

"Wh—" Louis says, glancing back even as he's struggling to keep his eyes open due to the overwhelming arousal he feels. Harry's pulled back from his ass and is staring wide-eyed at the spot next to them on the bed, and Louis immediately realizes why. "Spook, no," Louis hisses, waving a hand at the black cat who is now perched beside them in an effort to shoo him away.

Spook gives Louis another judgmental look and then turns, jumping off the bed gracefully and trotting back out the open door to Louis' bedroom. "Christ," Louis mutters, but he follows up the words with a spell and the wave of his fingers. The door slams shut and the lock turns, and Harry smirks at the knowledge that they won't be interrupted again.

"You're sexy when you go all witchy on me," Harry says, pressing a gentle kiss to Louis' ass cheek. He reaches across the bed and yanks open Louis' side table drawer immediately so he can grab the lube and pop the cap open, and Louis turns his face back into his pillow and wiggles his hips just enough to give Harry a bit of a show.

Harry smacks his hand on Louis' ass cheek, gentle but still enough to make Louis moan, and it's then that Louis feels the first finger breach him. Harry spreads his open finger by finger, minute by minute, and by the time he's open enough to take Harry's cock, he's rocking his hips into the bed and there are tears dripping down his cheeks. He's about to cry out desperately that he's ready, but when he's flipped back onto his back with one sudden movement, he realizes Harry already knows.

They're face to face again, tears still in wet tracks down Louis' face, and Harry smiles down at him.

"Love you," Louis whispers as Harry throws one of his legs over his shoulder, practically bending him in half in the process.

"I'm gonna show you how much I love you in return," Harry says gruffly, holding his cock with one hand as he guides it into Louis' hole.

He pushes in slowly, giving Louis time to adjust to every inch, and when he's all the way in, Louis closes his eyes tightly. Harry leans in so he can kiss Louis on the mouth and the motion only intensifies the feeling of Louis being split open, but he nods to Harry anyway to give him the approval to start moving. He doesn't need any more confirmation than that, and Harry immediately starts thrusting so hard that Louis can hear his headboard banging against the wall and knows Spook is probably just outside the door, waiting to judge them both when they come out.

Louis can hear himself letting out little whimpers with each thrust, but he's not able to stop himself—he's just along for the ride. After a few minutes, Harry lets Louis' leg slip off his shoulder and Louis immediately wraps them both around his back, pulling him in closer as Harry holds himself above Louis with his weight on his arms. Louis isn't sure how Harry is able to keep up the brutal pace of his thrusts and kiss him at the same time, but he supposes referring to what's happening between their lips right now as kissing is probably a bit of a stretch. They're panting into each other's mouths, Harry letting out deep moans and Louis letting out little whimpers, and occasionally their lips meet in something that slightly resembles a kiss.

"Can't believe I get to have this with you for the rest of our lives," Harry says as the pace of his thrusts starts to unravel, the consistency slipping away as they both get closer to the peak. "The only second chance I've ever gotten and I may not deserve it, but I'm not going to waste it, oh fuck—baby, I promise," he says, his hips stuttering.

Harry pushes all the way in and comes, flooding Louis' insides, and he can do nothing at all except hold on for dear life. Harry jerks him off just a few times before Louis is following him right over the edge, clenching around Harry's cock one more time and making him groan at the feeling. Louis can't help but cry out at how overwhelmed he is, and he can feel the magic thrumming in his veins.

"Louis," Harry says, trying to get his attention.

Louis forces his eyes open and sees colorful sparks flying around the room, bouncing off the walls and surrounding Louis and Harry where they lay with each other in their bed.

"You're magic," Harry whispers, and there's an amount of love and awe in his voice that is impossible to describe.

A smile spreads across Louis' face as he watches. His pain led him to pretend this part of him didn't exist for so long and he thought it would be like that forever, but watching it now, he's so glad that isn't the case.

"We're magic," he says, and that's the truth.

◾️☾ ⬛ ☽◾️