Archive of Our Own

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Louis was late. So, so late.  

But was it his fault that he had overslept? He'd had rehearsal till 10 and only gotten to bed after he'd finished all his homework, which was probably somewhere around 2 in the morning. He didn't mean to hit snooze multiple times and sleep through all his alarms. 

Okay. So maybe it was kind of his fault. 

He sighed as he opened his locker, jamming his bag in and grabbing his history textbook just as the bell for third period echoed through the hallways. Students started filing out of their classrooms, and Louis managed to effortlessly blend himself into the crowds of kids, throing a smile here and there to those who called out his name.  

He was the first person to reach his history class, ironically enough, and he made himself comfortable in his usual back-row seat, breathing a sigh of relief and leaning forward to rest his head on his arms. He heard a few people scuffle in but payed them no attention, determined to fit in a short nap before class started. 

"Yo! Twinklinson!" He heard a voice call out, and he sighed again, slowly lifting his head up to shoot what he hoped came off as a sufficiently bitchy glare at whomever had insulted him. 

He wasn't that surprised to see that it'd been Zayn, considering the fact that he was probably the only person in the whole school who could get away with calling Louis a name like that. 

It was partly because Zayn was a bit of a cocky asshole, often using his own sexuality as a license to call any other gay guys out, and partly because Liam, who would nobly beat up anyone that ever dared to make fun of Louis, practically melted at the sight of Zayn, turning into a blushing, blubbering mess whenever the dark-skinned boy walked by. 

"Pathetic." Louis had said once during lunch, after watching Liam choke on his milk when Zayn winked at him. "You are a sorry excuse for a human being."

Liam had just glared at him until his gaze had flickered over to Zayn, and he'd spent the rest of lunch staring at the back of Zayn's head, much to Louis' chagrin.

"Good one!" Louis replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Please, continue."

"So," Zayn said, ignoring Louis' attitude, "tell me more about Liam."

This made Louis straighten up a bit. "What?"

"Liam? Your friend? You guys are like, pretty close, right? What's his deal?"

"What do you mean, his 'deal'?" 

"Like...is he out? Questioning? Or does he just like staring at pretty boys?"

Louis chuckled at that. He gave Zayn a once-over and cleared his throat. "Do you dance?"

"Uh...what?"

"Can you dance?"

"I don't see what this has to do with anything." Zayn said, scowling.

"Liam's a dancer. He only dates boys who dance." Louis said.

It was complete bullshit--Liam would be on his knees for Zayn in a second if he asked, and Louis knew that. But Zayn didn't, and Louis' statement made Zayn squirm a bit, which gave him a sick sense of pleasure. 

"My, my!" Louis said, batting his eyelashes. "Little mister bad-boy don't know how to move? What a pity. You and Liam would've made such a cute couple."

"Fuck off, Tomlinson." Zayn said, grumbling something about stuck-up dancers as he walked over to his seat. 

Louis leaned back in his chair and smiled, his grin faltering when an unfamiliar body settled down in the chair in front of him. Louis poked the shoulder of the mystery guy. "Hey. That seat's taken." 

"Really?" A deep voice replied, and the boy in front of him turned around and oh. "I don't see anyone's name on it." He continued, smirking. 

Louis was too caught up in the guy's dimples to reply immediately, but he shook himself out of his trance quickly enough. "There might as well be." 

The guy cocked his head a bit, his eyes grazing up and down Louis' body. "A friend of yours, I presume?" 

"A best friend." 

"Ah." The boy said, smiling again and standing up. "Wouldn't want to get in the way of that. True brotherhood's hard to come by nowadays."

Louis smiled without realizing it, his smile growing even larger as he took in the boy's long, lean, leather-clad body. He stretched, exposing a pale strip of skin on his hip marked with several unintelligible lines of ink, and Louis had to physically restrain himself from reaching out and ghosting his fingers over the boy's tattoos. 

"What's your name?" He managed to blurt out as the boy adjusted his beanie and walked over to where Zayn was sitting. 

"Harry."

"Are you new or something?"

The guy--Harry--chuckled, his laugh deep enough to cause Louis' stomach to twist. "Is it that obvious?"

"No." Louis said quickly. "But...I would've definitely remembered seeing you around otherwise."

"Ah." Harry said, winking at Louis. "I'll see you around, then...?"

"Louis."

"Loo-wee," Harry sounded out, smirking. "Nice to meet you."

Harry sauntered off towards Zayn, plopping himself down in a seat next to the other boy, simply raising his eyebrows at Zayn's frown. 

"Yo, mate, this seat's taken." 

"Well, shit, is there anywhere a guy can sit in this class without being hassled by some gay dude?"

Zayn just looked at Harry for a moment and then broke out into a smile. "You know what? You're good right here. I'm Zayn."

"Harry."

Louis watched the two interact and chuckled silently to himself, because he'd be damned if Zayn wasn't trying to get into Harry's pants by the end of the week. 

He was still smirking at the two when Liam stumbled in, a bit out of breath as he sunk into his seat in front of Louis. 

"What the hell have you been doing?" Louis asked. 

"Where were you this morning?" Liam replied. 

"I asked you first."

"I had to talk to my English professor about something."

"Oh. Well I had a late rehearsal last night."

"Augh. Ballerinas. You lot are ridiculous." 

"Are you quite finished?"

Liam looked over to Zayn, like he always did whenever the boy was around, and frowned a bit when he noticed Harry. "Who's that?" He asked. 

Louis could sense the jealousy in Liam's voice and rolled his eyes in response. "New kid. His name's Harry."

Liam just grunted in response, still staring at the two boys, who were now cracking jokes and acting as if they'd known each other for ages. 

"I think they make a pretty good couple." Louis teased. "Don't you?"

Liam just shot Louis a glare and swiftly turned away from him, facing the front of the classroom as the teacher began to speak.

"Li!" Louis said quietly, rubbing his shoulders. "You know I was joking. Zayn's bad-boy ego is too big to let another one of his kind outshine him. He wants your pretty little preppy virgin ass."

Liam just flipped Louis off, but that was as good of an indicator as any that Liam had accepted his apology, so he leaned back in his chair again, sighing as he looked out the window. His eyes moved down to see Harry watching him intently, and the boy smirked when their eyes met. 

Louis wiggled his fingers at him in the most flamboyant wave that he could think up of, smiling when Harry broke out into a grin. 

He turned back to the front of the classroom, humming as he flipped through his textbook.  

This was going to be interesting. 

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Louis didn't see Harry again till lunch, where he wasn't surprised to find him sitting with Zayn's crew outside, smoking a cigarette and laughing, as if he was trying to torture Louis with his face. 

Liam was watching them too, but for an entirely different reason. 

"I don't like him." Liam stated bluntly once him and Louis had sat down. He didn't have to clarify who the "him" was, but Louis just rolled his eyes in response. 

"Jesus, Liam."

"I don't like the way Zayn looks at him."

"Well, Zayn asked about you today." 

"What?!" Liam's head jerked over to Louis so fast that he winced a bit, rubbing his neck, glaring at Louis as he cackled. "Shut up. What did he say?"

"He asked what was up with you."

"Well, what the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Apparently you're not flamboyant enough for him to get the right idea about you."

Liam was silent, and he looked a bit confused, so Louis rolled his eyes and continued. 

"He doesn't know if you're gay or not, you idiot." 

"Oh." Liam was quiet for a moment. "So does that mean he likes me?" 

"Maybe. But I told him you only date dancers."

Liam kicked Louis in the shin, hard, but Louis just laughed through the attack. "Why would you do that?!"

"Please. Zayn can't dance to save his life. Remember when we were showing off our routines after school that one day and he thought he could upstage us and just ended up making a damn fool of himself?"

Liam shrugged. "I thought it was cute."

"Yeah, well, any chance I get to make Zayn feel less superior to me, I'll take it."

"You're an ass."

"What about Louis' ass?" A voice called out, and the boys looked up to see a smiling blonde boy scootch into the seat next to Louis.

"Nialler!" Louis cried, pulling the newcomer into a hug. The boy laughed and reciprocated the action, pulling away to start work on his enormous tray of food.

"What? I don't get a hug from you, Li?" Niall asked.

"We saw you yesterday!" Liam protested.

"So?" Niall pouted.

Liam rolled his eyes, but smiled nonetheless. "Maybe when you're not surrounded by a tray of greasy food and an unbearable twat, I'll show you some love."

Louis stuck his tongue out at Liam and Niall just laughed, digging into his food. "What'd Louis do this time?"

"I'm pretty sure it's his life goal to not allow Zayn to ask me out." 

"I'm just saying that you can do better." Louis said, shrugging. 

"Uh, you can do better." Liam replied. 

"What? Is there a new bloke in Lou's life?" Niall asked, looking back and forth between the two.

Liam motioned towards Zayn's table, and Niall looked over. He turned right back around, though, a small frown on his face. "Oh," he said, clearly unapproving. 

"What "oh"? Why "oh"?" Louis said, frowning as well. 

"Harry, right?" Niall asked, and continued once Louis nodded. "Yeah, he moved in a couple houses down from me. Nice enough family."

"...but?" Louis questioned. 

Niall sighed. "I don't know, he just doesn't seem like a good guy, y'know? Seems like he's involved in a lot of weird shit. Saw him talking to some pretty shady-lookin' characters around town. I could be wrong, y'know, but...I'd avoid him if I had the choice."

Liam nodded in approval. "Good. So it's decided. Off limits to Louis."

"Hey!" Louis cried, pouting. "Who died and left you in charge?"

"Every relationship you've ever had." Liam answered, looking at Niall and giving Louis a stern look.

Louis groaned and put his head on the lunch table, defeated. "Fine." He mumbled. "No Harry."

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"I'm giving you a ride, right?" 

"Don't get your panties in a bunch, Payne, I'm coming! Gimme five minutes." 

Liam sighed over the phone. "Fine. But if I get a ticket for being parked next to the school like this, then I--"

Louis quickly ended the call, smirking at what Liam's face would have looked like at that moment, and continued stuffing his books into his backpack. He grabbed his duffel as well and shut the door, jumping a bit when he saw Harry right behind it. 

"Sorry," Harry said, smiling. 

Louis waved it off and started for the parking lot, his heart beating a bit faster when he realized that Harry was walking alongside him. 

"Do you need something?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at the taller boy. 

"Where're you headed?"

"Rehearsal."

"For what?"

"I dance."

Harry's eyes widened. "Really? What kind?"

Louis opened his mouth but hesitated. "You're gonna laugh."

Harry smiled but pulled it back. "No, I won't, I promise."

Louis rolled his eyes. "Ballet." He said, gauging Harry's reaction. 

Harry's eyes widened even more and he was silent for a bit, but he let a snort escape and Louis rolled his eyes, quickening his pace. 

"No, wait! Sorry." Harry said, catching up with Louis again. "It's not funny. Sorry. It's admirable."

"That's a new one." Louis said, smirking. 

"Takes a lot to be a ballerina, right? I know. I watched Black Swan."

"Ah, of course."

"No, really, it's nice. Ballet? It's...cute."

Louis rolled his eyes again and stopped walking. Harry stopped as well, brow furrowed. Louis kicked off his shoes and wiggled his toes, watching Harry take in a sharp breath. 

Louis knew his feet weren't pretty, but they were a great reminder to everyone for how tough he had it. They were littered with bruises of all colors, and he was pretty sure at least one of his toes were bent out of shape. 

"Pretty cute, huh?" Louis asked.

"Shit, man."

"Pretty much." Louis then slipped his shoes back on and made for the exit. "See you tomorrow, I guess." 

Harry snapped out of a daze, looking at Louis with a confused expression. "Uh. Yeah. Okay?"

Louis have him a small wave and then found Liam's car, slipping into it gracefully. 

"Decided to finally grace me with your presence?" The other boy asked, starting his car. 

"You're welcome." Louis smiled back, buckling himself in. 

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"Ladies." Louis said, as sensually as possible, leaning against the doorjamb in a ridiculous pose. "I've arrived." 

This earned him several shoes to the face, which he artfully dodged, laughing as he set his things down. "Hey!" he said, motioning to his face. "Don't hurt the moneymaker."

"Please, love," Perrie replied, reaching behind to pinch his ass. "We all know what the real moneymaker is."

"Watch it, Edwards." Louis said, grabbing her and slinging her over his shoulder, pinching her ass as she squealed and laughed, demanding to be put down.

"Mr. Tomlinson." 

Louis froze, immediately setting Perrie down. She scampered over to the other girls, who'd also stopped giggling. Louis took a breath and turned around to face his instructor with what he hoped was a dazzling smile. 

"Alina!" He said, walking forward to hook his arm through hers. "And how are you today?"

"Just as unimpressed as I was yesterday." She replied, motioning towards the gaggle of girls at the corner of the room. "You can do better than this lot." She said, a smirk on her face. 

Louis immediately relaxed, letting out a laugh at the girls' offended expressions. "Come, come, ladies, there's enough of me to go around."

"I'll say." Perrie replied, laughing when Louis flipped her off. 

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"It's Friday!" Louis sang as he waltzed into his history class, Liam right behind him. He sprang into a jeté, landing lightly on his feet. Someone started applauding and Louis turned to find Harry clapping joyfully, laughing as Louis blushed but took a bow anyways. 

"I thought the room was empty..." Louis started, shrugging. "Sorry."

"No, no, don't apologize." Harry said. "It was nice. Not cute at all."

Louis broke into a grin and Liam looked between the two of them, obviously confused. 

"Hazza!" Zayn called out as he arrived, and stopped right behind Liam, who was still in the middle of the doorway. Louis looked over to see a mischievous smile on Zayn's face as he slowly placed his hands on Liam's hips, touching way more skin than necessary, and quickly turned him around so that their chests were pressed together. Liam was bright red and didn't even look like he was breathing, but Zayn seemed to take no notice of that as he spun them around so that his own back was now facing the classroom. 

"Excuse me, babe." Louis heard him whisper, and then watched him practically peel himself of off Liam, walking backwards until he plopped down into his seat. 

Louis walked up to Liam and snapped his fingers a couple times in his face. "Liam, honey, breathe."

Liam took a large gulp of breath, and Louis could feel his racing heartbeat when he grabbed his wrist and sat him down. "He's got you so whipped, man, you're done for." 

It was only then that Louis remembered Harry's existence, and was surprised to see that the boy was still just watching him and Liam. "Isn't Zayn waiting for you?" He asked Harry. 

"Why would Zayn be waiting for me?" 

"Aren't you two...like...?" 

Harry frowned for a moment, then smiled, then started laughing. "What? Seriously, Louis, I've only known him for, like, 24 hours."

Louis shrugged. "Zayn's moved faster."

Harry's laugh died down till he was just smiling at Louis. "I mean, I'm sure we're friends, but...he's definitely got his sights set on someone else." Harry moved his gaze so it was on Liam and then looked back at Louis, smirking.

"Well thank god it's finally confirmed." Louis said. "I've been trying to prep Liam for heartbreak for ages now, especially since you came along, but I--"

"Geez, does everyone think that about me and Zayn?"

"Probably not. We just tend to jump to conclusions."

"That explains all the cold shoulders I've been getting from Liam." 

"To be fair, you haven't really been properly introduced yet."

"Well, now's your chance." Harry said, shrugging.

"Er--" Louis began, looking between Harry and Liam. "I, uh, I think I'll leave that to Zayn. Killing two birds with one stone and all that, y'know." He turned to Harry. "But I'm curious...would you be making moves on Zayn if he wasn't so strangely obsessed with torturing Liam?"

Harry chuckled. "Zayn's cool, and really pretty, too, as I'm sure you've noticed, but, uh, he's not really my type."

"Oh, really, now?" Louis asked. He saw his teacher enter the classroom and sat down, facing the front, getting his things out of his backpack.

"Well, you see," Harry said quietly, now leaning down so that his lips were brushing against Louis' ear, "I have this thing for ballerinas." 

Louis could do nothing but blush and cursed himself for how red he had to be turning. He didn't turn to watch Harry walk over to Zayn and sit down, but his ear still tingled with the touch of Harry's lips, and that was all Louis was able to think about for the rest of the class.

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"I can't do this," Louis groaned, flopping back onto Niall's bed. He'd avoided Harry for the rest of the school day, even though he really didn't want to. He'd found some excuse to always be just out of Harry's reach and the other boy's defeated expression at the end of day absolutely broke Louis' heart. "He's so fit, you guys, I can't."

He didn't miss the look that Niall and Liam shared before Niall crawled onto the bed next to Louis. 

"Both of you are being terrible people." Louis pouted. "What happened to not judging a book by its cover?"

"We're just tryin' to look out for you, man." Niall said. 

"A broken heart means a broken Louis means double best-friend duties from both me and Niall." Liam said, rolling his eyes at Louis' frown. "I'm only telling you the truth. When Stan broke up with you, I gained five pounds from your ice cream binge." 

"Stan was an asshole." Louis retorted. "Harry's not like that."

"He doesn't seem like that." Niall corrected. "You've only known him for two days." 

Louis sighed. "Fine. Whatever. I'll mope privately and leave you two alone."

"Onto new topics!" Niall cried, repositioning himself onto his elbows on Louis' stomach, ignoring his protests. "What're our plans for this weekend?"

"We already got the weekend off," Louis said, squirming, trying and failing to get Niall off his stomach. "That's a gift in itself." 

Liam cleared his throat. "There's, uh, there's this party."

Both Niall and Louis froze in the middle of their scuffle on the bed to stare at Liam, mouths agape. 

"Liam suggesting a party? What has the world come to?!" Louis said, smiling. 

"All right, mate!" Niall said, sitting up and rolling his eyes at Louis' sigh of relief. "Details?"

"Well, uh," Liam began, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's tomorrow night. It's, uh, at...Zayn's house?" 

"No way. He invited you to it?" Niall asked. 

"He just texted me about it earlier today, so..."

"He has your number?" Louis cried. "How long have you two been sexting?"

"We don't sext!" Liam said, frowning at a chuckling Louis. "I gave him my number a while back. Anyways. He's in a band, y'know, he's a great singer and stuff, and they're going to play at his party tomorrow. He said to bring whoever I wanted, so I guess I'm stuck with you two idiots."

Both Louis and Niall cheered. 

"Party!" Louis cried. "Par-ty, par-ty," he started to chant enthusiastically, and Niall joined in, giggling. They stood up and started jumping on Niall's bed, screaming at the top of their lungs, only stopping when they saw Liam's expression. 

"I am so done with the both of you." Liam said. 

"Wait, hold up." Louis said, jumping off the bed and onto the floor. "Zayn's house. That means that Harry's going to be there."

"Uh, yeah, probably?" Liam said. 

"This is not fair. First you say I can't date him, then you force me into going to a party where he'll be there, all drunk and handsy and cute?"

"Okay. First of all, no one is forcing you to come to this party. I'd probably be happier if you didn't show up, to be completely honest. Second of all, how the hell do you know he's handsy?"

Louis chose to ignore the first part of Liam's reply. "Are you kidding me? He is the most handsy-looking person I know. Even more than Zayn. And that's saying something. Which reminds me." He turned to Niall. "The greatest thing happened to Liam today."

"Ooh! Tell me more, tell me more, did he get very far?" Niall half-sang, winking at Liam. 

"Wait, stand in front of me." Louis said, and then proceeded to act out Zayn's actions using a giggling Niall. By the end of it, both Louis and Niall were in tears and Liam was just as red as he'd been during the original event. 

"You two are uninvited to the party." He said, but Louis and Niall just stuck their tongues out at him. 

"Okay." Louis cleared his throat, holding his hands out in front of him. "Booze," he said, moving his left hand, "and Harry," he continued, moving his right. He moved them up and down until his left hand was higher than his right. "Booze wins, I suppose."

"Good. Guess I'm driving then."

"Boo, you buzzkill!" Niall cried, grabbing Liam in a headlock an giving him a noogie. 

Liam broke out of Niall's hold, adjusting his shirt. "If either of you puke in my car this weekend, you're never getting rides from me ever again."

"Stop being so pessimistic! It'll be fine, I promise. C'mon," Louis said, grabbing Liam's wrist and pulling him close. "Let's figure out how you're going to woo Zayn tomorrow."

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Louis did nothing all day Saturday, waiting till the last minute to get himself ready for the party. Niall and Liam were waiting in his room as he styled his hair in the bathroom.  

"Louis," Liam whined. "Hurry up! We're going to be late."

"Shut up, Liam." Louis replied. "The party's all night, you can never be late for one of these. Plus the drunker everyone is when we show up, the more fun we have!" 

Louis looked at his reflection and gave a small nod of approval, and then walked out of the bathroom, rolling his eyes as Niall wolf-whistled. 

"Jesus, Lou, did someone paint your pants on?" He asked, raising an eyebrow. 

"You don't want to know how long it took to get these on." Louis replied, and that's all he said on the matter. 

Twenty minutes, a wrong turn, and an ignored stop sign later, they found themselves at Zayn's house--or mansion, it seemed like--and entered to find the party in full swing. It wasn't long before both Louis and Niall had beers in their hands, shots still burning in their throats. Liam just rolled his eyes. 

"I'm gonna find Zayn." He said.

"Obviously." Louis replied, waving him away. He grabbed Niall's waist. "Let's dance, babe."

They'd only been on the floor for about 10 minutes, though, when someone shut the music off and ordered everyone into the backyard. Panic swept through the crowd as people started freaking out about police until all eyes landed on a huge stage set up in the grass, with five guys and a bunch of instruments on top of it. 

Louis looked through the guys and his eyes widened when they landed on the guitarist. No way. 

Liam was suddenly at his side. "Hey, guys, just in time!" He said giddily, his cheeks pink. If Louis didn't know any better, he'd think Liam had been drinking. Fortunately, he did know better, and realized that Zayn had probably caught a hold of Liam not so long ago. He silently cursed himself for missing that interaction. He grabbed Liam's arm.

"Harry's the guitarist." He said, frowning. 

"Yeah. I heard he's pretty good." Liam replied.

"How does he know any of their songs? He's only known Zayn for as long as he's known me!"

Liam shrugged. "Like I said, I heard he's pretty good. Probably good enough to learn a few songs in a couple of days?"

Louis was about to say something else when feedback rippled through the speakers set up on both sides of the stage. 

"Whoops," Zayn said in the mike to the groaning party guests. "Sorry, guys. Anyway. Hello, boys and girls!" 

A cheer ran through the crowd, and Zayn smiled, pausing to wink at Liam, which just made Louis and Niall scream even louder. 

"I'm Zayn and this is One Direction! We've got some great songs for you tonight--I should know, I wrote some of them--so shut up and rock out!"

The crowd roared again and Zayn smiled, motioning to the drummer to count him in. Everyone was silent as the first notes of the guitar echoed through the backyard, Harry's fingers moving effortlessly across the instrument, and Louis was sure that no one was even breathing at that moment.

Then Zayn started singing, his voice melting into the guitar, punctuated by the bass. The drums and keyboards joined in soon after, and then everything was off beat but so perfectly in time, Zayn's voice leading it all. Louis found himself in the middle of an awestruck crowd, everyone jumping and cheering. He had Niall in one arm and Liam in another, his drink lost and forgotten, and the three were jumping in time to the music, their hearts pounding with the bass.

The band played a few more songs, some originals but mostly covers, which explains why Harry was able to play with them so soon. Once their set was done and the applause had died down, the crowd filed back into the house, still buzzing off the high of the show, ready to pick up the party where it'd stopped.

Zayn found them soon enough, his hand coming up to rest on Liam's shoulder. "Hey boys." He said. "Enjoy the show?" 

"Yeah, you were amazing." Liam said, blushing a bit when Zayn's hand slipped lower to settle on his waist.

"More like ama-Zayn!" Louis giggled, and Niall joined in, the two in hysterics while Liam and Zayn just rolled their eyes.

"Okay. So." Zayn said, pulling Liam a bit closer. "I showed off my talent. Now it's your turn."

Liam froze. "What? Here?"

"Pretty please? For me?" Zayn said, pouting a bit and batting his eyes. Louis wasn't surprised when Liam bit his lip and turned to go talk to the DJ, probably to put on a song he knew a routine to. Zayn's eyelashes were a force to be reckoned with.

"Enjoy the show?" A low voice drawled, and Louis turned to find Harry smiling down at him, bottle in hand.

"You're too late. Zayn already used that line." Louis said, smirking.

"Ah. Damn. And?"

"Well, Liam's about to dance for all of us, so…" Louis shrugged, then froze when he heard a familiar Chris Brown song flow through the speakers. "Shit." He said, making Harry's eyebrows raise, and then Liam reappeared in front of them, grabbing Louis' arm.

"If I'm doing this, I'm not doing it alone." He said tersely, and Louis had no choice but to follow him into the middle of the dance floor, tailed by Zayn, Niall, and Harry.

Liam had picked Run It, a song he and Louis had learned a routine to years ago, but Louis didn't think he remembered any of it at all until he mimicked Liam for the first sixteen counts and then felt his muscle memory kick in, his body moving of its own accord, completely comfortable with the music. 

This was what Louis loved the most about dancing; it was almost an out-of-body experience sometimes, the way you moved before you even thought. So Louis didn't think at all, instead letting his limbs do what they knew while he surveyed the crowd.

Everyone knew him and Liam were dancers by now, of course, but it had been news when they were littler. Louis had gotten the worst of it, a pre-puberty phase where the fact that he was a ballet dancer was enough for him to garner some negative attention at school, but Liam's clenched fists and angry glares were enough to keep most of the bullies at bay. Plus, once both he and Liam had come out--which had happened to be through a very embarrassing game of spin-the-bottle when they were 14--no one really cared, because the guys weren't jealous anymore since the girls were just drooling over something they couldn't get.

Louis loved performing, especially in front of people like this, a rough crowd that was amazed by the smallest, most unimpressive things to dancers. He was so in tune with Liam, which came from years of being best friends and dance partners, and they were able to read each other's minds when they danced together, setting each other up for tricks and stunts that made everyone go wild. Plus Louis always managed to throw in a fouette here and there, which never went unappreciated.

His eyes found Zayn, Niall, and Harry, and he winked at the latter, who was watching him and Liam with an expression of awe. Zayn was less awestruck and more proud, his eyes twinkling as he cheered for Liam and even Louis once in a while. Niall had probably seen this routine the umpteen times Louis and Liam had practiced it in front of him, but he hollered and wolf-whistled nonetheless, smiling the entire time.

The routine ended before the music did, so Liam and Louis took a bow and let other people fill in the dance floor again. Louis danced with no one in particular for a while, just moving to the music by himself. He saw a few people drunkenly attempting to copy him and Liam so he turned to Liam to point them out but the boy was nowhere to be seen, and Louis just smirked.

"Looks like Zayn got what he wanted, eh, Nialler?" He said, looking to Niall, but the blonde had disappeared as well, and Louis just looked around him, confused, wondering when he'd been ditched. He felt a large pair of hands slip onto his waist, and heard Harry's familiar voice in his ear. "You look like a lost little puppy."

Louis pouted, turning his head so he could see Harry smile at him. Harry leaned into him, definitely a bit tipsy, but found his footing when Louis leaned back, pressing his back to Harry's chest. "I'm not lost," he said, reaching over to grab Harry's cup from his hand. He took a gulp of the drink inside, grimacing as it burned its way down his throat. "Augh!" He cried, watching Harry chuckle at his reaction. "What is this?"

"Honestly? I have no idea." Harry replied, smiling. "I just poured a little bit of ten different things into a cup. Experimentation."

Louis frowned but finished off Harry's drink, giving the empty cup to Harry, who just tossed it over his shoulder. Louis raised his eyebrow but said nothing, smiling as Harry pulled him closer. 

They were swaying a bit, Louis realized, but not really dancing, so he slowly adjusted their movements to the music until they matched the beat, their hips aligned. They were both pushing into each other, so Louis took the opportunity to slowly grind his ass onto Harry, smirking at the gasp that escaped the tall boy's lips. But Harry just tightened his grip on Louis and started to grind right back, till the two of them were making their own rhythm, oblivious to the music or anyone around them. It was only when Harry leaned down to press a kiss to Louis' neck that Louis froze.

"Oh. Uh, sorry?" Harry said, but Louis just let out a shaky laugh.

"No, no, it's--it's fine, don't worry." He said. "Keep going, don't let me stop you."

Harry smiled and leaned back down, working the kiss into a lovebite, slowly nipping the skin and dragging his tongue over the bruise. Louis' breath hitched but he didn't care, because every touch from Harry was going straight to his cock, and he was definitely paying the price for wearing such tight fucking pants tonight.

Harry noticed too. "I'm flattered, truly." He murmured into Louis' ear, letting his hands ghost down so that his thumbs were hooked in the waistband of Louis' pants.

Louis couldn't take it anymore. He spun himself around so his chest was pressed against Harry's. Liam wasn't around. Niall wasn't around. And what they didn't know wouldn't kill them.

He pressed his lips onto Harry's, stomach fluttering at Harry's immediate response. They kissed chastely for a little bit until Harry's tongue sneakily slipped into Louis' mouth and then everything was a dizzy mess of teeth and tongue until they broke apart, both of them panting lightly.

"Do--are you eating something?" Louis said, brows furrowed, his teeth tingling from where they'd clacked against what was probably a piece of hard candy or something like that.

Harry chuckled and stuck his tongue out and Louis' eyes widened at the silver barbell poking out of the middle of it. 

"Oh." He squeaked out, and Harry laughed. "Have you had that for a while?"

"Couple years now."

Louis hummed in response, and then pulled Harry down to kiss him again, this time massaging Harry's tongue with his, flicking at his piercing with the tip of his own tongue, pulling apart when they were out of breath again.

"Fuck, Louis." Harry said, his eyes dark as he licked his lips and reached down to gently squeeze Louis' ass.

Louis hissed and brought their hips together, eyes growing wide as he realized that Harry was just as hard as Louis, their erections now pressed together in the most amazing way. Louis didn't even want to move because he knew how ridiculously fast he would come in his pants if they started grinding again, so he pulled Harry's head down to whisper in his ear.

"Can we finish this somewhere a little less…public?" He asked, and Harry nodded eagerly, grabbing Louis' hand and pulling him out of the room. Louis expected him to go upstairs but Harry went out the front door instead.

"I think the lawn counts as public," Louis said, cocking his head to the side, and Harry laughed and pulled out a set of keys from his back pocket. He took them to a sleek black car and unlocked the doors, pulling them both into the backseat and locking the doors behind them.

Louis was on top of Harry now, and the moon was shining through the car window, bathing them both in white light, and Louis could swear that Harry looked like a porcelain doll, his cheeks flushed and lips pink. He just seemed so vulnerable, the exact opposite of everything he usually was around Louis, and it made Louis' stomach twist again. 

He adjusted himself so he was straddling Harry's hips. He reached down to brush Harry's hair off his forehead and managed to move a bit of it when his eyes landed on the side of Harry's face.

"Jesus," he exhaled, reaching down to brush over Harry's ears. 

Harry probably had every ear piercing imaginable, three or four lining his lobe and then several more in his cartilage as well. His first lobe piercing was stretched a bit, large enough for Louis to probably fit the tip of his pinky finger through, and the rest of his piercings boasted either metal studs or hoops. He reached over to the other side of Harry's face and found almost the same thing, with some piercings in a few different locations.

"When did you get all of these?" He asked, ghosting his fingers over all the studs.

"I got my first ones when I was about 13, I think?" Harry said, eyes closing as he sighed with Louis' movements. "But I got kind of, uh, addicted to them, I guess? Not much space left up there, though, so I had to move on to the rest of me, y'know?"

Louis sat up. "You have more piercings?"

"You're welcome to look for them." Harry said, smirking, and then gasped as Louis leaned down and kissed him. Louis' hands slipped underneath Harry's shirt, and once they'd gotten it off, he broke the kiss to admire Harry's torso, running his hands down the length of it.

"I found a couple more," he teased, fingers barely touching Harry's studded nipples, moving on to touch the dark lines of the tattoos littered across Harry's chest. There was a pair of swallows right at his collarbone, which Louis doesn't know how he never noticed, and some dark paisley design across the left side of Harry's ribcage. 

"I used to have a couple in my eyebrows and one in my nose too, y'know." Harry drawled out, and Louis pored over his face until he could make out a few indentations above his eyebrow and on his nostril. "My parents said that those were a little 'too public', though."

"Did they let you get all of these?" Louis said, unable to stop himself from touching every part of Harry's exposed skin. It didn't seem like Harry was against it, though, and he hummed happily at Louis' touch, nodding.

"Well, they know about most of them." He added, winking.

Louis' hands finally reached the waistband of Harry's pants, and he hesitated a moment before unbuttoning them and pushing them off Harry's legs. He finally got to see the full tattoo he'd caught a glimpse of the other day, a large feather gracing Harry's right hipbone. He rubbed his thumb across it and then moved further down Harry's legs, glancing up at Harry's face before leaning down to lick a stripe along the tattoo.

Harry gasped and bucked his hips up, and it was as if both of them suddenly remembered why they were in the car in the first place. All Louis could feel now was how tight his pants were and he managed to stand up and wiggle out of them, pulling his briefs off with them and tossing his shirt aside.

Harry was watching him, amazed, and cleared his throat before speaking. "You're quite, uh, flexible." He said, eyes grazing up and down Louis' body.

Louis blushed but rolled his eyes. "Ballerina. Duh." He replied, pulling Harry's boxers off. Something caught the light and Louis had to blink a couple times before his jaw dropped. "You have got to be kidding me."

Okay, so Harry was huge, but Louis had been expecting that, because of course he would have been big, it was just the universe's way of fucking with Louis. What Louis hadn't been expecting, however, was the thick silver barbell that was poking through the head of Harry's cock.

"Seriously?" He exclaimed, both curious and wary.

Harry hadn't been able to stop smirking since Louis' mouth had fallen open, and he reached down to grip the base of his cock, slowly moving his hand up till it was at the tip, rubbing against the piercing. "I can take it out if you want…?" He asked, brow raised, but Louis shook his head no because, yeah, this may have been one of the strangest things he'd ever seen, but it was so unbelievably hot, too, and all he could think about was how good it would feel to have Harry's cock in him, what his piercing would feel like inside him, and his own cock twitched in response. 

"No, no, it's…it's good." Louis said, leaning down to slowly lick a stripe from the base to the tip of Harry's cock, pausing at the top to place a small kiss and then poke his tongue at the piercing. Harry shuddered so Louis did it again, wrapping his mouth over Harry's tip and playing with the barbell, letting Harry tangle his long fingers into Louis' hair. 

Louis would be pissed if he couldn't get himself to deep-throat Harry, so he pushed down, further and further, until he felt the piercing hit the back of his throat, making him let out a long moan that buzzed around Harry's cock. Harry gasped but forced himself to not buck up, and Louis was thankful as he slowly pulled off, taking Harry back in his mouth about halfway and then fisting the rest of his length. Harry let out a deep moan, his hand gently guiding Louis up and down. Louis reached down to cup Harry's balls, softly massaging them as Harry quietly cursed beneath him. He felt Harry's balls tighten and then stroked Harry faster, mouth still wrapped around Harry when he came, coaxing him through his orgasm until he was breathing softly, albeit a bit irregularly.

Louis licked his lips, licking the tip of Harry's cock softly. Harry still had his hand in Louis' hair so he pulled Louis up into a kiss and deftly turned them around so that he was on top. "My turn," he said, smirking, and settled himself in between Louis' legs, artfully taking the entire length of Louis in his mouth in one go. Harry's tongue stud rubbed against the underside of Louis' length as he continued to deep throat him, and Louis was almost embarrassed at the guttural sounds coming out of his mouth. Harry pulled off Louis with a pop but continued working him with both hands, twisting and rubbing and stroking until Louis was shaking underneath him. He leaned down and stuck out his tongue, teasing the tip of Louis' cock with his piercing, and then Louis was coming into Harry's mouth, arching high up off the seat of the car and crashing back down, utterly spent. 

Harry kissed and licked his way up Louis' body till he got to the lovebite he'd planted on him earlier, and kissed that as well. Louis pulled him into a deep kiss, his tongue pushing against Harry's until he could taste himself, moaning when he did. The two kissed slowly for a while, until a loud buzzing noise echoed through the car, making both of them jump.

"Fuck," said Louis. "That'll be my phone."

He fished through their discarded clothing till he found his phone, sighing when he saw that it was Liam calling.

"Hello?" He said, reaching for his underwear.

"Lou? Where are you?"

"Uh…around?"

"Seriously, hurry up, we need to go."

"What? What time is it? I thought you were with Zayn, I thought--"

"Yeah, well you thought wrong, all right? Now shut the fuck up and come meet me in the foyer, okay?" Liam yelled, hanging up right after.

Louis just blinked at his phone a couple times before clearing his throat. "Okay…" he drew out. He looked up at Harry. "Something's wrong. I'm sorry. I have to go."

"…right. Okay." Harry said, finding his own clothes and awkwardly getting dressed, frowning when Louis giggled at how cramped he was.

Louis was dressed way before Harry, having mastered the art of the quick-change through many years of multiple dance performances, and was out of the car, shivering a bit in the chilly air when Harry stumbled out of the back seat.

"Shit. It's cold." Harry said, wrapping his arms around himself, and Louis could literally see his nipple piercings through his thin white shirt. He rolled his eyes.

"You're ridiculous." He told Harry. "Got your keys? C'mon."

Harry nodded and followed Louis to the back of the house. "Wait," he said, pushing Louis into a wall and kissing him hard until they both couldn't breathe. "Okay, you can go."

Louis shook his head but laughed, pinching Harry's side before running into the house. 

Liam was standing solemnly by the front door, next to a very jumpy and worried-looking Niall.

"Hey guys!" He cried, skipping up to them. "What's up?"

All Liam had to do was look up to meet Louis' gaze and Louis knew that something had gone terribly wrong. "Shit. What happened, Li?" Louis asked, reaching a hand out to rub his shoulder, but Liam just shook his head and stormed out the front door, slamming it behind him. Louis turned to Niall but Niall just shrugged. 

"He won't tell me anything either."

The ride home was silent and awkward, any attempt at conversation shot down by Liam's pained expression. When they got to Louis' house, he refused to get out of the car. Niall did the same at his place, so Liam sighed defeatedly and drove them all over to his house, rushing inside and locking himself in the bathroom before the other boys could confront him.

"Li, babe," Louis said gently, knocking against the door. "Please let us in."

"We just want to help." Niall added softly. "We just want to know what happened."

"I'm pathetic, that's what." They heard Liam say from inside the bathroom. "I'm pathetic and stupid and a complete pussy and Zayn's never going to talk to me ever again."

"Liam, what--" Louis began, but then Liam unlocked the door and swung it open, his eyes rimmed red with tears.

"He tried to have sex with me." Liam said softly, then spoke louder. "He tried to have sex with me, like, actual sex, all the way, and I--I chickened out. He doesn't know that--that I'm a virgin, he doesn't know that I've never done anything like that and he probably hates me and thinks that I'm an idiot and he's never going to talk to me again."

"Damnit, Liam." Louis said, pulling him into a hug, opening his arms when Niall joined in. Liam sunk to the floor, pulling the other boys with him, and Niall and Louis cocooned Liam in their arms, quietly shushing him and rubbing his back until Liam had stopped crying and was just taking ragged breaths.

"He doesn't hate you." Louis said. "He likes you way too much to stop feeling that way just because you said no when he tried to get in your pants."

"I wanted to have sex with him!" Liam cried. "I wanted it so bad but I was so afraid that he would think that I was bad at it or that I would do something stupid and he'd be so turned off that he would leave so…so I left."

"Liam," Niall began. "Everyone has a first time. If Zayn really likes you--and we know he does--then he wouldn't care. Actually, if I were Zayn, I'd be flattered. Fit bloke like you, willing to give it all to me? I'd be honored." Liam chuckled quietly and Niall smiled, poking him in the cheek. "There we go." 

"Hey, have I ever told you about my first time?" Louis said, poking Liam's other cheek.

Liam rolled his eyes. "Probably." He said between hitched breaths. "Something about how great it was and how glorious it felt to finally be a man or some shit like that."

"Wow, I'm an asshole." Louis replied, smiling.

Liam raised his eyebrows. "It was that bad?"

"Mate, it was terrible." Louis said. "Both me and Greg were virgins, we had no idea what we were doing. We were both just going off of what we'd seen in porn and it was a right disaster. Neither one of us had fun, and by the time we could look each other in the eyes without blushing, which was like a whole week later, we'd both moved on to other guys." 

Niall laughed loudly and Liam was smiling, biting his lip, so Louis continued, shrugging. "I thought I wasn't gay because of that, and I was so confused because I knew that I didn't like girls and that I liked guys but if I couldn't have sex with a guy then what was the point, y'know? It was just annoying until the next time I had sex, when, yeah, it was pretty great and I knew that Greg and I had just majorly fucked up."

"Anyway," Louis finished. "The point of this story is that I'd rather have walked out on my first time if I felt uncomfortable with it instead of going ahead and ruining something so beautiful for myself by being a little twat. So, I admire you for that, Liam. You did the right thing, okay?"

Liam nodded, much more relaxed now, and blew his nose.  

"I'm thinking," Niall said, "we pop in a Batman movie and pig out? You've got food, right, Liam?"

"Of course, you pig." Liam said, giggling, and pulled both him and Louis in for a hug, muttering a soft "thanks" before jumping up and herding them all to the kitchen.

------------ 

By the time Monday came around, Liam was a bit tense again, scared about going to school and seeing Zayn face-to-face. He'd had his phone shut off all weekend, and when he and Louis turned it on Monday morning, they were greeted to a multitude of messages from Zayn, all of which were promptly deleted by Liam, who refused to read or listen to any of them, not even allowing Louis a peek before he got rid of them.

Liam managed to avoid Zayn for the first couple class periods, texting Louis when he got to history class.

lou come quik zayn is gonna come soon i need u!!!! :((

Louis sighed and grabbed his things, freezing when he felt an arm wrap around his waist. "Hello there," Harry spoke, his voice so low that it made the hairs on the back of Louis' neck stand up. Louis closed his locker door and twisted himself out of Harry's grip.

"Uh…hi." He said, offering a small smile, then quickly walking towards his history class. 

Wait, fuck, Harry was in that class too.

Harry caught up to Louis easily enough. "Hey, uh, is everything okay?" He asked, concern creasing his forehead.

"Yeah, uh, Liam's just a bit down right now, so…"

"No, no, I mean, um, between us?"

"Oh. Yeah, of course, why wouldn't it be?"

"Because you wouldn't let me hug you a minute ago. And because you haven't looked me in the eye since I said hello."

Louis stopped walking, turning to look at Harry. He stared straight into his eyes, avoiding how sad and worried and heartbroken they looked, and gave a tight smile. "There. Happy?"

He could see his classroom door right in front of him, so he ran in quickly and managed to loudly pull Liam into a conversation just as Zayn was about to approach him. He kept glancing at the door, waiting for Harry to walk in and make him feel like crap, but Harry didn't come in.

Even after the teacher had called everyone's attention and finished taking roll, Harry didn't come into class. He looked over at Zayn and saw him texting furiously, so he could only imagine what was going on. Harry cut class. Zayn was pissed. Liam was scared. And Louis felt like shit, because he was doing all of this just for his best friends.

Harry managed to catch Louis at lunch, when Louis had stepped into the restroom halfway through the lunch period. He knew Niall was looking after Liam, so he didn't feel bad about leaving his table. He'd washed his hands and was about to leave when Harry stormed into the bathroom.

"Fuck." Louis breathed out, and then let Harry drag him into a stall, where he pinned Louis against the door. "Harry, listen, I--"

"No." Harry said, and he looked positively furious, so Louis shut up. "You listen. All right? I have been fucked over by enough guys in my life to know when someone wants to hump-and-dump me. And last night? You definitely weren't one of them. And I get that Zayn and Liam are having their own issues right now, but you know what? That's their problem. Not ours. So if that's the reason that you're ignoring me and being such a catty little bitch to me right now, then you need to get over it. Because they have nothing to do with us. And I'll be damned if I let someone like you out of my grasp, you understand?" Louis swallowed and nodded. 

"Good." Harry finished, and loosened his grip on Louis's shirt. "I just wanted to talk, and--"

Louis pushed off the stall door and into Harry's arms, pressing a fierce kiss to his lips. Harry took a few steps back in surprise but caught himself in time and let Louis slam him against the stall wall, spreading his legs open and sliding down so that Louis had to lean down to kiss him.

"I like you Harry, shit, I really, really, do." Louis said once they'd broken apart.

Harry bit his lip. "…but?"

Louis sighed. "But. My friends have done absolutely everything for me in the past, they've sacrificed so much for me whenever I've fucked things up, which, no surprise, has been pretty often. They gave me one thing that I wasn't allowed to do, one thing that was off-limits, one solid rule, and I broke it last night, Harry."

"It's me?" Harry said, confused, and Louis pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I don't have a good past. With boys. I've dated some crap guys who've done terrible things to me and I've…I've done some crazy shit with some guys, and Niall and Liam have always pulled me through, they've always had my best interests in mind. And they…they don't think that you're good for me." Louis finished, sighing and looking down at the tiles. "And the least I can do is listen to them, because I really do adore you, but if I get with you and I fuck things up, like I tend to do, then I'll lose their trust and yours, and I don't want that. I can't--I can't deal with that. It'd kill me."

"Lou," Harry breathed, smiling, and Louis' head perked up at the nickname. "You won't fuck things up. Trust me. I'm just as much of a mess as you are, okay? And I really like you, I want to do this, I--"

"I can't, Harry." Louis said, backing away and unlocking the stall door. He watched Harry's smile slowly fall and could practically see the hope leave his eyes. "I…not this time. I'm sorry." He finished, practically whispering, and slipped out of the stall, pushing his way out of the bathroom, blindly stumbling into the crowded lunchroom. 

He made his way to his table, where Liam and Niall were sitting and laughing, and took a deep breath, reminding himself how he was doing this for them, how much they'd done for him. Remembering Niall's bruised face and Liam's broken wrist, how Louis had almost gotten arrested, how he'd been one pill away from accidentally throwing himself off a building, and how, through it all, Liam and Niall had stayed by his side, fought with him, and been his best friends, when even Louis didn't think he could handle being friends with himself.

He shook himself out and sat down, stealing a carrot from Niall's plate.

"What's so funny?"

"Liam and I were just discussing why you were in the toilet for so long." Niall said, winking.

"I had beans for breakfast, you see." Louis replied.

"Ah, yes, I understand." Niall said, laughing at Liam's disgusted expression. "It seems, however, that young Liam here does not."

Louis gasped. "How unfortunate! Don't you think, Niall, that we, as such good friends, should educate him about the subject?"

"Why, of course, Louis!" Niall said, and Louis cleared his throat dramatically. 

"Beans, beans, the musical fruit!" He sang loudly, causing people at a few nearby tables to turn and look at him. Liam's face was bright red and he was scrambling to cover Louis' mouth, but Louis just jumped over to sit next to Niall instead. "The more you eat, the more you toot!"

Niall was a giggling mess at this point, but he picked the song up. "The more you toot, the better you feel!"

Louis threw a hand around Niall's shoulders and the two harmonized on the last line. "So eat your beans at every meal!" They finished, even louder than in the beginning, and Louis stood up and bowed at a the scattered applause, sitting back down to poke at Liam's pink face, laughing. 

Liam started cracking up. "I can't believe you just did that!" He said, practically crying, and Niall's smile was blinding, and Louis' face hurt from grinning so hard and that's when Harry walked into the lunchroom and looked right at their table, at the three of them smiling and laughing. He froze, his eyes meeting Louis', and gave a small nod, walking over to where Zayn was sitting.

Louis sat still, confused for a moment, but then waved the feeling away and focused on his friends instead.

"If you're really lucky, Liam," Louis said, grabbing Liam's hands, "you'll get an encore in a few minutes."

And the look on Liam's face was enough to have Louis and Niall dissolving into giggles again.

------------

Louis exhaled as he observed the empty room. There was no one else in the studio, and that's how he liked to rehearse. He spread himself out in the middle of the floor, laying on his back and closing his eyes, letting the past few days sink into his bones.

Harry. Liam. Zayn. Harry. School. Dance. Harry. Niall. Harry.

Fuck.

Louis sat up, stretching himself out. As far as he knew, Harry was fine being acquaintances with Louis, and not much more, though Louis didn't really blame him. He'd nod a greeting at him once in a while or give a small wave in class but that's about it, and although Louis hated to admit it, it was probably for the best. He was already thinking about Harry every goddamned minute, and he didn't need to have to worry about touching or kissing or stroking or--fuck, he was supposed to be rehearsing, not fantasizing. 

He stood up, determined. No more Harry for the next hour. Just him. Just ballet. Nothing else.

------------

Louis loved sneaking into Liam's rehearsals, because Liam was a completely different person when he danced. He was cool and focused, his moves risky and wild, unlike his usual precise and controlled demeanor. He came in from the back of the room, watching Liam dance with Jade--his performance partner for the showcase. They were doing some futuristic-themed piece, with a lot of throbbing dubstep tracks, but Liam was totally into it, moving fluidly like he had no bones in one moment, then stiff as a board in the next, pretending to break himself into pieces. 

When the track ended, Louis clapped with the rest of the audience, whooping obnoxiously so that Liam noticed him.

"You little twat." Liam said when he got close, a towel around his shoulders. "Need a ride?"

"Duh." Louis responded. While Liam packed his things, Louis stepped into the middle of the room, trying to see if he could remember anything from Liam and Jade's routine. He'd worked out a couple moves while watching, and played through them, adding his own twists and a bit of ballet into hit. He stopped once he noticed Liam watching him, amused.

"Shut up."

"I didn't say anything." Liam said, smirking. "But I always wondered why you chose ballet."

"Fewer boys?"

"Not good enough."

"Okay. Uh…I guess it was because it made me feel manly?"

"That doesn't even make sense."

"I'm a small person, Liam! If I chose hip-hop I would've been the little guy, probably grouped with the girls, labeled as feminine, blah blah blah. I picked ballet because, there, I'm a big guy. I'm as tall as the girls, I can pick them up, and I'm considered strong and probably as masculine as you can get in that dance form, y'know?"

Liam nodded his understanding. "I guess I get it. I just don't understand how they let you in with that ass."

"Shut it, Payne." Louis said, turning sideways to examine his butt. "They knew it looked great in spandex, that's why."

Liam chuckled and Louis grabbed his things, following Liam out the door. 

They walked down the hall, Louis shamelessly peeking into different empty studios.

"You're gonna disrupt a class."

"Who cares? We're practically royalty around here. What're they gonna do, call security? I mean--" Louis stopped talking, his jaw practically on the floor. "Shit, Liam, come look."

"What is it?"

"Shut the fuck up and come here, quick!" Louis called, and Liam leaned over to peek into the studio Louis was looking into. It was a standard hip-hop class, one of the basics. Liam had taught it last summer, although the number of students during the school year was significantly smaller. It was easy, then, to pick out one particularly skinny, tan boy, arms covered in tattoos and a snapback perched precariously on his head.

"Is that Zayn?" Liam whispered loudly, shocked, and Louis clasped a hand over his mouth so the subject of discussion wouldn't notice them peeking. The class was almost over, just around five minutes left, so the students were going through the full routine in groups. There were some particularly bad dancers, Louis noted with distaste, and a few that had promise. There were a couple people who knew exactly what they were doing--they could've probably danced at Liam's level. 

Then Zayn stepped up with his partner, some short girl with too much fake tan and unruly blonde hair, and both Louis and Liam stopped breathing. The music started, some R&B song--"You Should Let Me Love You," Liam said, and Louis nodded in recognition--and Zayn started moving with his partner.

It was an individual dance, and the girl next to Zayn was doing the dance all wrong, way too hyped-up for the song and off-beat a couple of times. But Zayn was right on track. He moved slowly, every action synchronized with a word, his body fluid. He had great control of his hips, Louis noticed, and probably one of the better body rolls he'd ever seen. He even managed to work his hat into his routine a couple times, but otherwise, his eyes were trained on the floor, lips moving to the song. Louis was sure he was singing along, and he was also sure that Zayn would've killed the song, considering how smooth his voice was. 

It was a small routine, just a minute and a half long, pretty standard for a class like this, but everyone applauded when they finished, including Liam and Louis, and Louis had to physically bite his tongue to stop himself for cheering for Zayn like he had for Liam.

"We have to confront him." Louis said suddenly, turning to Liam, his eyes shining with determination.

"What? Are you out of your mind? I'm not talking to him."

"Liam, why you think he's taking dance classes?"

"I don't know. Maybe he was jealous of what he saw at the party?"

"You're an idiot. Remember what I told you I told him the day he was asking about you?"

"…no?"

"I told him that you only date dancers. Dancers, Liam."

"Wait, you don't think--"

"Yes. Look. If you were Zayn and your crush, who you almost had in your bed, bailed on you at the last second with no explanation, what would you think?"

"That…that he was nervous?"

"No, dumbass. You would think that they weren't into you like that." Louis said, rolling his eyes. "Now. Look at Zayn. He knows you dance, and that you love it. And the only information he has relating to the type of guy you like is the one I jokingly fed him. The poor thing's trying so hard, Liam."

"He--he still likes me?"

"Are you kidding me? Even I wouldn't go through this much for a guy. We both know how much he used to suck at dancing, Liam, look at him now! Think of how long he's been practicing. For you."

"…shit."

"Do you know what this means?"

"I'm an idiot."

"Well--yes, that. But it also means that Zayn thought you didn't sleep with him because he wasn't a dancer." Louis said, clapping between his words. "Do you know how shallow of a person that would make you? And he still wants you. What a fucking idiot. You two are totally meant for each other."

Louis peeked into the studio again and saw Zayn packing up his things, heading for the door.

"Quick! Here he comes! Act natural!" Louis whispered tensely, moving so that he was on the other side of the door. "You stay there!" He said, and then suddenly collected his features as Zayn walked out.

"Zayn!" Louis cried, startling the boy, who jumped a bit.

"Fuck, Louis, you scared the shit out of me." Zayn said, shaking his head and clutching his chest. He didn't turn around, thankfully, so he was completely oblivious to Liam standing right behind him, just as Louis had intended. He was going to wrangle a confession out of this kid if it killed him.

"What're you doing here?" Louis said, putting on the best confused expression he could muster.

"Oh. Uh…I was, uh," Zayn cleared his throat, looking down at the ground. "Dancing?" He said, his voice so low it was almost a whisper. But Louis picked up his confession anyways, and grinned.

"Really? Last time I had the opportunity to watch, you were a pretty shit dancer."

"Shut up." Zayn said, narrowing his eyes at Louis. "I'm a lot better now."

"But, uh, why the sudden interest in the activity, Zayn?" Louis asked, smiling as he saw a blush creep over Zayn's cheeks.

"Maybe I just wanted to learn."

"You're a terrible liar."

"Okay, fine." Zayn said, exhaling defeatedly. "You told me Liam liked dancers, all right? And…he didn't really seem to like me as much as I thought. So I figured that if I, y'know, became a better dancer or something, he might notice me and like me like…like I like him."

"That," Louis said, stepping closer to Zayn, "is so incredibly ridiculous. I never said anything of the sort."

Zayn froze. "What? That's not true. I remember you saying that Liam liked dancers, Louis. Don't fuck with me like this!"

"I never said dancers." Louis said, crossing his arms. "I said singers. Why do you think Liam came to your party?"

"…you're lying."

"I'm his best friend. Why would I lie?"

"You mean I--I've been doing all this," Zayn said, motioning to the studio behind him, "for nothing?"

"Well, I wouldn't say it was for nothing, mate." Louis said, smiling up at him. "You've got a great body roll."

"I am going to kill you." Zayn replied, and Louis just put on a big shit-eating grin. 

"Wait." Zayn continued. "If he didn't care if I could dance or not, then why did he walk out on me?"

Louis opened his mouth to reply, but Zayn had already dropped his bag to the ground. "Fuck. He's straight, isn't he? He doesn't even like me that way, and I--I tried to sleep with him. Oh my god. No wonder. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. I'm such a dumbass!" He finished, kicking the wall. 

Then he paused, and swiveled around to face Louis, his mouth set in a line. "You." He said, grabbing Louis by his shirt. "You told me he liked guys. You set me up."

"Now why would I do that?" Louis choked out, still smiling.

"Because you hate me? Because you're evil? Because you're a right bastard? Who the hell knows?" Zayn said, grinding his teeth. "I really am going to murder you, Tomlinson."

"All right, but before you do, you might want to turn around."

"What? Why?" Zayn said, his grip on Louis loosening.

Louis sighed, exasperated, and grabbed Zayn's shoulders, flipping him around to face Liam. Zayn froze, his expression one of pure shock, and Liam blushed, biting his lips and smiling.

"Hi." Liam said, clearing his throat. "You, uh, you were good in there." He continued, motioning towards the studio.

"You--you, uh, you saw me?" Zayn said, taking a nervous gulp. 

"You really do have a great body roll," Liam replied, smiling wider.

Zayn was still frozen in place, but Liam let out a shaky breath and walked towards him, gently taking his hand and intertwining their fingers together.

"Just…a few things to clear up, okay? Um, one: I like boys. A lot." Liam said, smiling as Zayn visibly relaxed. "Two: I don't care if you can dance. Or sing--although it is an added bonus. You're pretty perfect already." Liam continued, blushing. Zayn bit his lower lip, trying to hold back a smile, and Louis was literally jumping in place, flailing wildly, trying to get Liam to keep going.

"And…three." Liam said, pulling Zayn in close, speaking in almost a whisper. "I've never had a boyfriend before. I've never done anything…serious before. I was so afraid that you were expecting more of me that night so I bailed, and I'm sorry." Liam reached out for Zayn's other hand, holding it tight. "I should have told you, and I'm so, so, sorry," Liam finished, his breath stuttering as Zayn leaned in so that their foreheads touched.

"Shit, Liam." Zayn said, smiling. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have rushed you like that, I just--I thought that's what you wanted. Damn, I'm an idiot. I'm sorry." He repeated, still smiling.

"This is so beautiful!" Louis cried, bringing the two boys back to reality. "Gorgeous. A cinematic masterpiece. Heart-wrenching. Unfortunately, I have book report due tomorrow, so if you two are willing to just hurry up and kiss already, I can get home in time to save my English grade. How's about it?"

Liam groaned. "I'm sorry he's such an idiot." He said quietly, smiling as Zayn chuckled. 

"I heard that!" Louis cried, smiling nonetheless.

"Good." Zayn said, and leaned in to gently press his lips against Liam's. Liam froze for half a second and then sighed into the kiss, wrapping his arms around Zayn's shoulders and pulling him closer. Zayn's tongue had just broken past Liam's lips when Louis literally stepped in between them, prying them apart.

"Great one, guys." Louis said. "Really romantic. It's a kiss for the history books. Hey, speaking of history books, why don't we wait to do the kissy-kissy till class tomorrow, and in the meantime, keep it PG in the halls of this family-friendly establishment?" Louis said, emphasizing the last few words. "C'mon. You two can hold hands as we walk to the parking lot or something."

------------

Zayn and Liam were completely and utterly nauseating in the beginning.

It was bad enough that Louis had to see them at school, holding hands and giggling and being stupidly in love, but Zayn started coming to Liam's dance practices, quietly sitting in the corner and watching the other boy with awe, and even started getting rides from Liam, effectively cutting Louis off from stopping over at Liam's after school or hanging out with him on Friday nights. Luckily they kept their original seats in history class, but they were constantly texting each other and quietly giggling, and Louis was sure his eyes were going to fall out with the amount he'd been rolling them.

What made this all worse was that now Louis was stuck with Harry being everywhere he went. Niall and Louis would show up for a lunch date with Liam, which meant Zayn, which meant Harry. It was painfully awkward, at least for Louis, since Harry looked like he couldn't care less about the strangeness of the situation. He always gave terse smiles to Niall and Louis when he saw them, spending the rest of his time consumed by his phone. Niall didn't seem to care and just shrugged, usually creating conversation with Louis or with Liam, whenever his lips weren't attached to Zayn's. 

Eventually Louis even managed to have a few conversations with Zayn, and, surprisingly enough, he enjoyed them all. Zayn was smart, funny, and so utterly devoted to Liam that it was practically pathetic. The whole "bad-boy" image he tried to convey didn't run very deep, and Louis was surprised to learn just how sensitive and sweet Zayn was. Niall even developed his own relationship with Zayn, too, laughing at his stupid jokes and swapping stories with him whenever he could.

Harry gave up trying to speak to Zayn altogether whenever the five of them hung out, choosing to pick at his food glumly or incessantly text a random contact in his phonebook. Louis' stomach dropped whenever four of them laughed at a joke and Harry sat, pasting a fake smile onto his face, obviously uninterested in whatever was going on around him.

In fact, it was almost a month until Harry spoke to Louis again.

Zayn was having another party, something big and unnecessary to celebrate his and Liam's one-month-anniversary. The idea of it all was utterly ridiculous, but the intentions behind it were adorable, and who was Louis to pass up some free booze?

The place was packed, even more so than the last time Louis had been at Zayn's house, and all the heated memories of Harry's car kept Louis constantly nursing some drink or another all night. He danced with a few guys, but after two different boys tried to slip something into his drink, he got the hell away from that crowd, instead making his way into the backyard and sinking down into an empty plastic chair next to a roaring bonfire.

"Lou-wee!" A voice called out from the dark, and Louis froze, watching a clumsy Harry stumble across the flat expanse of Zayn's yard. As his eyes adjusted, he saw how glazed over the boy's eyes were and how his smile was wide and mischievous.

"Do you know what today is?" Harry slurred, sitting down in front of Louis, resting his head in his arms on Louis' lap.

Louis cleared his throat. "Um…no?"

"How rude." Harry said, frowning. "It's the one-month anniversary!" He cried, spreading his arms wide. A few people cheered in the distance.

"Oh. Uh yeah. That's the reason Zayn threw this party, right?"

Harry looked at Louis and tilted his head, confused. "Did you tell Zayn?"

"Um. Didn't Zayn know? This is his house. Plus, he's so obsessed with Liam, he's probably ready to celebrate their weekly anniversaries too." Louis said, snorting.

"What're you talking about?"

"What're you talking about?"

"Almost a month ago," Harry said, getting up on his knees and holding on to either side of Louis' chair, "we kissed. Remember?"

Louis froze, unable to think of what to say, watching Harry's delighted face. He didn't dare breathe as Harry leaned closer, his breath reeking of alcohol. "It's our one-month anniversary." 

Harry leaned back, biting his lip. "We should celebrate." He said, after a moment's consideration.

Louis found his voice again, swallowing dryly. His cup was empty, and he wished he had some tequila to numb himself from the feeling that was creeping through his stomach as Harry slowly reached down to rest his hands on Louis' thighs. "What do you suggest?" He managed to squeak out, shuddering as Harry leaned forward to nuzzle his neck.

"Let me fuck you." Harry said slowly and clearly, his tone low, and it almost sounded like he was sober for a moment until he pulled back and Louis saw how wide his pupils were, how he was struggling to keep himself from swaying as he looked at Louis and slowly licked his lips. 

He didn't know what came over him at that moment, but all he could think about was Harry and how he was here and actually talking to Louis after so long, so he nodded in agreement. "Okay." He whispered, standing up and lifting Harry up as well, letting him lean against his own body. "Okay, yeah."

They stumbled into a bedroom, Harry swatting Louis' hands away from the light switch. Louis glanced around and took in the dark walls of the room and completely unnecessary amounts of leather crammed into the closet, coming to the conclusion that they were in Zayn's room. About to have sex. On Zayn's bed. Shit.

Harry didn't seem to notice anything off, however, and attached his mouth to Louis' neck, biting it all over, as if to ensure that Louis would have a dark purple ribbon of bruises blooming across his neck in the morning. Louis moaned and shoved Harry backwards, giggling as he fell onto the bed, and started taking his clothes off. Harry smiled and did the same, until both of them were just in their underwear, staring at each other from across the room.

Louis gulped. This was his last chance to back out. He could grab his clothes, bolt out the door, and never speak of this to anyone again, not even Harry. But then Harry reached down and pressed the heel of his hand into his bulge, moaning low, and Louis forgot everything that was running through his mind and practically sprinted across the room to jump onto Harry. 

"Fuck," he breathed, as Harry caught him easily and slid their mouths together.

Louis sat on Harry's lap, grinding feverishly, his cheeks warm as he kissed Harry. "Get your clothes off." Harry whispered roughly, breaking off the kiss, and nipped at Louis' earlobe. Harry's voice had lost all the warm slowness that it had had just a few moments ago, and Louis gave him an enquiring look but quickly stood up and pushed his briefs off, helping Harry to do the same. Harry's hands pulled Louis onto him and then he expertly flipped the two of them onto the bed so that Louis was pressed underneath Harry, their cocks barely touching. Louis moaned as Harry pushed his hips forward and ground down on him, wrapping his arms around Harry's shoulders. He felt Harry reach off to the side and open the nightstand drawer, and his stomach started to flutter. He didn't realize he was holding his breath until he felt a cold, slick finger gently trace around his entrance, and he immediately gasped, his heart skipping a beat. 

He opened his eyes to see Harry watching him intently, reading every expression on Louis' face with a curious look on his own. He slowly pushed his first finger in, watching Louis arch his back as he pushed in to his knuckle. He worked it out and slowly pushed it back in a few more times until Louis opened his eyes. 

"Please, Harry, shit, one more," he breathed out, watching Harry bite his lip as he worked a second finger into Louis. Louis writhed underneath him but pushed down himself on Harry's digits, gasping when Harry changed the angle of his hand so that his fingertips brushed Louis' prostate.

"Can I…?" Harry started, and Louis nodded fast, desperate to have Harry in him. Harry pulled his fingers out and stretched a condom over his length, rubbing some more lube onto himself before gently pressing his tip to Louis' entrance. Louis could feel the cold metal of his piercing, even through the condom, and he whimpered, trying to shimmy his body down onto Harry's cock. Harry reached up and grabbed his arms, easily catching both of Louis' wrists in his palm, and pressed them into the wall, holding Louis in place. He slowly pushed himself in, just the tip, but Louis let out a sigh of pleasure, humming pleasantly as Harry pulled out and pushed himself back in, inch by inch until his hips were pressed against Louis'.

Louis opened his eyes, wondering when he'd shut them tight, and smiled shyly up at Harry, who was peering down at him intensely.

"Hi." He said quietly, blushing when Harry bit his lip and smiled warmly.

"Hi." Harry replied, letting go of Louis' wrists and leaning in to catch his lips in a kiss, which Louis enthusiastically returned. Harry dragged himself out of Louis, and quickly pushed back in. Louis' breath hitched as Harry's barbell rubbed against his prostate, and Harry started picking up speed, working himself in and out of Louis till his chest was flushed with exertion.

Louis mirrored Harry's movements, reaching down to stroke himself as he felt the pleasure building at the bottom of his torso. Harry noticed and added his own hand to Louis, working him till Louis gasped Harry's name and came over both their hands and his own chest. Harry moaned and fucked Louis faster, only lasting about a minute before he cried out and collapsed on top of Louis, body shuddering with the aftermath of his orgasm.

Louis pulled Harry in for another kiss, this one slower and sweeter, his tongue gently working its way around Harry's mouth. Harry pulled out and Louis whimpered a bit at the empty feeling but smiled when Harry swallowed the sound, his tongue moving with just as much excitement. Harry pushed himself up and grabbed a handful of tissues from the bedside table, cleaning Louis and himself off before he collapsed next to Louis, leaning in close and nuzzling the side of his head.

Louis let out a long breath, sated, and automatically brought his hand up to gently trace the lines of Harry's jaw. "That was nice." He said quietly.

"Yeah." Harry whispered back. "Yeah, it was."

Both of them were quiet for a moment until Harry spoke again. "Why are we whispering?" He said, and Louis started giggling till Harry joined in. They laughed for a minute, and Louis felt at peace until he heard a distant buzzing noise.

"I think that's my phone." He said automatically, and the smile fell from his face when he realized why someone would be calling.

Because they were looking for him. Because they were his friends. His friends who said that he couldn't be with Harry. Louis' smile fell.

"I have to go." He said quietly, and slipped out of Harry's embrace, quickly putting his clothes on, avoiding looking the other boy in the eye. "Shit, I have to go. This…I shouldn't have done this. We shouldn't have done this, Harry."

Louis felt for his phone and pulled it out. He had a several texts and missed calls from Liam and Niall, and even one from Zayn, meaning that Liam was getting pretty desperate. He shoved his phone back into his pocket and reached for the door.

"Why?" Harry said, and it was so quiet that Louis almost missed it. He heard it, however, and froze, unsure of what to say. "Why shouldn't we have done this?" Harry continued, his voice still almost a whisper.

Louis struggled to find his voice. "I…You know why, Harry, I've told you before, I--"

"Fuck, Louis!" Harry cried, jumping off the bed so that he was standing in front of Louis, stark naked. In any other situation Louis would have laughed, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from Harry's face. "Do you even know what you're doing to me? What I go through every time I see you?" Harry continued, walking closer so that Louis' back was pushed against the door. Harry wasn't much taller than Louis, but right now he towered over the boy, eyes dark.

"It's been a month. A whole fucking month." Harry said, his hands clenched into fists. "And I've tried doing everything I can to get over you. But it's impossible. And I don't--I don't even know you that well, Louis! It took me just a few days to become completely head-over-heels for you. And now I can't get you out of my head. I don't know what to do anymore. All I think about is you. Your smile, your eyes, your…everything. The more I look at you, the crazier I become about you. And you won't even glance in my direction anymore. What the hell am I supposed to do, Louis?" Harry finished, his volume significantly louder than when he had started. 

Louis opened his mouth but didn't know what to say. He just continued to stare at Harry, his own eyes starting to fill up with tears. "I--" He began, but was quickly cut off by Harry's lips. Harry kissed him slowly and with so much adoration that Louis started to cry right then. When Harry pulled away, biting his lip, Louis could see a million unanswered questions shining in his eyes, and all he wanted to do was jump into Harry's arms and kiss him, touch him, be with him forever. But he bit his tongue so that he wouldn't do anything rash, and Harry noticed. 

"All right." Harry said, taking a shaky breath. "All right, then, okay. I--I don't know why you think you have to do this, why you can't have the same feelings for me as I have for you, even though I know you want to, Louis. I know you want this as much as me."

Louis didn't say anything, instead opting to look at the ground, but Harry slipped his fingers underneath Louis' chin and tilted it up so that their eyes locked.

"Keep this in mind, though," Harry started. "I'm not going to stop trying to get you. You can run away as much as you want, Louis, but I'll always find you." Harry leaned down and quickly pressed his lips to Louis'. "Always."

And then Louis managed to yank the bedroom door open and almost fall down the stairs, tripping over the mass of people and spilled drinks and his own two feet, when he was supposed to be a coordinated dancer, for god's sake, and didn't stop running until he found Liam and Zayn cuddled up by the bonfire.

"Hey, Louis." Zayn said, raising an eyebrow. "You, uh, okay there?"

"Yeah!" Louis said, catching his breath. "Yeah, I'm good, got anything to drink?"

Liam rolled his eyes and tossed Louis a bottle of water. Louis gave him a sour look but obediently took a swig anyways. "Thanks. Now do you have anything to drink?"

"Lou! My man!" Niall cried at that moment, stepping out of the house with four bottles of beer in his hands.

"Nialler!" Louis said back with just as much enthusiasm, smiling and surprised at how easy it was for his friends to raise his spirits. "How's it hanging?"

"Well, mate," Niall said, passing around beers to everyone, "I just got the best blowjob in Zayn's bathroom, so it's not really hangin' at the mo'." Niall finished, winking as Louis cackled.

"Good on you, man!" He replied, taking a long drink of his beer.

"Hey, has anyone seen Harry?" Zayn enquired, and Louis choked on his drink. Niall furrowed his eyebrows as he patted Louis on the back. Zayn looked Louis up and down. "It's just that I called him a while back and he never replied, I just want to make sure he's fine."

"Hello, boys." A low voice called out, and Louis' twisted stomach could easily tell who it was. 

"Speak of the devil!" Zayn cried, smiling. "What've you been up to this whole party, Harold?"

"That's not my name." Harry said, frowning, then perked up when he saw Liam's untouched beer. "Mind if I…?" He said, gesturing towards it, and Liam shook his head, handing the drink over. Harry took it gratefully, taking a long, graceful gulp while Louis stood and practically melted at the sight of Harry's throat illuminated by the light of the fire. 

Harry finished drinking, letting out a relieved sigh, and glanced over at Louis, who was still looking at him. "Geez, Lou, it's not polite to stare." He said, giving Louis a cheeky grin, and Louis turned red, taking a long swig of his beer. 

"Anyways," Harry continued, turning to Zayn. "Not much. Just stood in the shadows of the party most of the time. Made sure that none of your shit got totally destroyed. I've been so sober it's almost angelic. This is my first drink of the whole night." He finished, making sure to look at Louis as he spoke that last sentence.

Louis gulped. This meant that Harry was completely sober when he'd stumbled into Louis' lap earlier, and Louis suddenly realized all the times during the night that Harry had been completely not-drunk. Shit, he was a good actor. Louis was going to kill him.

"So, guys," Harry said, settling himself into an empty lawn chair, "how about all of you?" He turned to look at Louis. "Louis? Haven't really seen you around tonight."

Louis frowned. "Maybe I've been avoiding you." He said curtly.

Harry clenched his jaw and switched his gaze to the fire. "Did a damn good job of it." 

Louis saw Zayn look between them, confused, and then Liam cleared his throat. "Okay! Glad we got that settled. Now," he said, turning to Louis and Niall. "Need a ride home, boys?"

"Love one." Louis said, making sure to not glance at Harry, though he could feel the other boy's gaze boring into his side. 

"I'm good, actually." Niall said. "Is it cool if I stay here tonight, Zayn?"

"Yeah, man, you're welcome to." Zayn replied, smiling. "You can too, if you want, Louis."

Louis fidgeted. "Um." He began, but thankfully Liam swooped in to save him any embarrassment.

"Louis has a…thing tomorrow. For his sisters. In the morning. He probably needs to go home as soon as possible."

Harry snorted and Louis glared at him for just a second, eyes snapping back to Zayn's right after. "Liam's right. I need as much sleep as I can get. It was actually a terrible idea coming to the party tonight." His eyes flickered over to Harry, who was staring intently at the fire. "I didn't enjoy myself at all." He finished quietly, feeling something tug at his stomach when Harry clenched his jaw again and swallowed.

"Oh. Well…I'm sorry?" Zayn said, confused.

"No, no, it's not you." Louis said, putting on a small smile. "I just have a lot of…things going on at the moment. Sorry. Liam?" He said, waving bye to everyone and practically sprinting to the front lawn, stopping at Liam's car.

Liam showed up a couple minutes later and wordlessly pulled Louis into a hug.

"I--" Louis began, but Liam shushed him, rubbing circles into his shoulders.

"You don't owe me any explanations." Liam said, and Louis closed his eyes, his heart aching with guilt.

"I do." Louis said, and Liam's hand stilled for a moment before moving again.

"Okay. Well, then, not tonight, all right?" Liam replied. "Let's get you home."

Louis got into the car and stared blankly ahead for the entire ride home, only snapping back to reality when Liam gently placed a hand on his shoulder. "We're here, Lou." He said quietly, and Louis forced himself to smile at Liam as he got out of the car. 

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

"You going home too?"

"Uh, actually, Zayn was saying that--"

"No worries, man. Good for you. Have fun!" Louis said, winking and smiling for real.

Liam seemed to let out a sigh of relief as he smiled back. "You're an ass."

"Goodnight, Li."

"Goodnight, Lou."

Louis entered his house silently enough and stripped down to nothing when he got into his bedroom. He stepped into his bathroom and gasped when he turned on the light.

Harry had certainly made his mark. A million of them, it seemed, because it almost looked as if Louis was wearing a purple choker around his neck. He touched the bruises gingerly, wincing at the small bites of pain, and let out a long sigh, examining his weary reflection in the mirror.

He showered quickly and tucked himself into bed completely naked, eyes closed but sleep nowhere on his mind. Instead, he tossed and turned with thoughts of Harry clouding his mind, to the point where he gave up trying to fool himself into getting any rest at all and just stared at his ceiling, letting everything flood over him.

He finally got to sleep hours later, when drowsiness completely took him over, Harry still on his mind.

------------

Harry certainly wasn't joking when he said that he wouldn't stop trying with Louis. It was like Louis was seeing him everywhere, school being the worst of it. Harry had somehow managed to rearrange his schedule so that he could walk behind Louis to every class, and Louis could do nothing but let his cheeks burn as he tried to speedwalk to his next period.

He was also much more social at their hangouts now, often chiming in during conversations to make the dirtiest joke he could possibly tell, staring at Louis all the time. He'd even throw in an obscene wink now and then.

These actions weren't going unnoticed by Liam and Niall, though, who took them as a sign to make sure that Louis stayed as far away from Harry as possible. Louis didn't need to be told twice. He avoided Harry like the plague, to Liam and Niall's surprise, and never mentioned him in any conversation. He did his absolute best to have nothing to do with Harry.

That is, of course, until he'd drink.

The thing is, Zayn had a lot of parties. Louis wasn't kidding when he'd said that Zayn would celebrate every week of his relationship with Liam, and that's practically what Zayn did, throwing huge get-togethers every couple weeks. Louis had no idea where Zayn's parents were or where he was getting the money for the booze, and Liam didn't even drink, but Louis would take any chance he could get to get completely hammered, and there was one tall, brunette, green-eyed reason why.

Because when Louis was drunk, he focused in on one thing. He forgot about his past, about the pain, about the promises he'd made, and all his attention would be focused on Harry and Harry alone. 

And Harry loved it.

Louis never knew if Harry was as drunk as him--or if he was even drunk at all--but he didn't care, because as soon as they were alone, their hands were all over each other, tangled up in hair and clothes and pressing hard bruises into smooth skin. He and Harry probably had sex in every room of Zayn's house at least once, and in Harry's car on several occasions as well. 

Louis had to watch where he let Harry mark him, especially after one particularly embarrassing dance rehearsal where Perrie had made a big show of pointing out a large lovebite on Louis' collarbone. But Harry was open to marks anywhere, and Louis took the opportunity to color in his tattoos, painting the feather on Harry's hip with blooming red bruises, splashing tones of purple into the designs on his chest. 

The sex was good. Amazing, in fact, and it always amazed Louis how new it felt to have Harry in him. He thought he'd grown tired of it by now, but every time Harry entered him, it was like it was the first time, and Louis was always left a blissful, boneless mess at the end.

But it didn't mean anything. It couldn't, and Louis made sure Harry knew that. He never stayed for more than just a couple minutes after they'd finished, maybe pressing a quick kiss to Harry's lips before he escaped from him, never making eye contact because he was scared to death of what he'd see in Harry's silent gaze.

------------

"This is Aiden," Harry'd said one evening, as he'd slid into the restaurant booth where the other four boys were sitting. Liam and Niall gave small smiles to the newcomer, while Zayn raised an eyebrow and Louis just seethed.

Aiden was tall, perfectly coiffed, and incredibly ripped. Louis could tell. He was sure the whole damn world could tell, actually, by the smooth curve of Aiden's arms in his tight, tight shirts. Aiden was perfect, so funny that Harry didn't take his eyes off of him during the entire meal, so charming that Harry swung his arm over Aiden's shoulder and gently played with the sleeve of his shirt, so gorgeous that Harry stared at his mouth for a whole two minutes--Louis timed him--before looking away.

And Louis was jealous. Louis could barely keep his food down, wordlessly pushing his still-full plate to Niall halfway through the meal. He didn't want to admit it, but he absolutely loathed the attention that Harry was giving the other boy, and he bit his tongue to keep from screaming, so hard that he tasted blood.

Harry brought Aiden to Zayn's next party. Louis felt crestfallen and betrayed, but he tried not to show it, laughing the entire night through and dancing with strangers, glancing over at Harry to find him not even giving a care about Louis at all. 

Harry fucked Aiden in his car. Louis knew because he quietly followed Harry as he led his partner off the dance floor and out of the house and kissed him in the moonlight. He saw Harry push Aiden into the backseat and strip down to nothing, held his breath as the windows fogged up and he could barely make out Harry pounding into the boy. 

"This is Rita," Harry said a week later, and this time, everyone at the table gave him a look of surprise. Harry either didn't notice or didn't care, because he slid in with Rita and paid attention to no one but her for the entire meal.

Louis was ready to murder him. A girl? Seeing Harry with another boy was bad enough, but this was a new low, and he didn't even bother trying to cover glaring at Harry for the whole meal. Even Rita noticed, and cleared her throat awkwardly, attempting to start a conversation with Louis, but he wasn't having it, his full attention on Harry, who did nothing but absentmindedly stir his drink.

Rita attended their school, as it turned out, which Louis had never known, and he watched Harry kiss her at her locker, ignoring the incessant gnawing at the stomach that reminded him that it could have been him in her place.

And so it went on, with Harry bringing a new boy or girl to their dinners every week. Even Zayn seemed to get a bit worried at Harry's behavior, and Liam and Niall just used it as more proof as to why Harry was a terrible human being.

"You see what we saved you from?" Niall mentioned casually one night, tossing a pretzel into his mouth as he lounged on Louis' bed. "He's a full-on player."

"Shut up, Niall." Liam and Louis said at the same time, giving each other surprised looks right after.

------------

And so the year went on, and Louis wore out as the days dragged by, his dancing and Harry's behavior completely consuming his thoughts. He wasn't even thinking of graduation, but it sure seemed like everyone else was, especially when they met up for dinner. This week, Harry had managed to score a small red-lipped creature named Cher who looked at Harry like she wanted nothing more than to completely devour him.

"Just one more test, lads, and we'll be free to go!" Niall cheered, and the other boys raised their glasses in agreement. "So what're everybody's plans?" 

The table quieted down a bit and Zayn cleared his throat. "Harry and I have some news."

Louis looked up from where he'd been playing with his straw wrapper, suddenly interested in the conversation. "What?" He said quietly.

"We're moving to L.A." Harry said without looking over at him, and Louis' head turned to look at Harry so fast that he was sure he'd broken something in his neck.

"What?" He repeated again, a bit louder.

"It stands for Los Angeles. California." Harry continued, still only looking at Cher, who was doing something obscene with the hot dog on her plate. "America."

It was as if Louis' throat closed right then, and he started choking on air, Niall thumping his back and giving him water. As Louis recovered, Liam looked back and forth in between Zayn and Harry, confusion and a bit of hurt playing over his features. 

"When did you make this decision?" He asked, stopping to look at Zayn, who looked down and started playing with his napkin. 

"We--we, um, got a meeting with a label. He saw One Direction performing on YouTube? He thinks we have a lot of potential, but we'd have to move out there as soon as possible. I was going to tell you sooner, but--"

"But what?" Liam interrupted. "You didn't want to tell your boyfriend?" He said, bitterly. "I need some air."

"That sounds like a really good idea." Louis said, and Liam grabbed his arm, dragging him outside of the restaurant. 

"What the fuck is going on?" Louis said as he got outside, his eyes blazing.

"I have no idea, Louis, oh god. Oh god, oh god, does this mean Zayn wants to break up with me?" Liam said, turning to Louis, and his eyes were already full of tears, his expression so sad that Louis could do nothing but let his own anger wash away as he pulled Liam close.

"No way, babe." Louis said quietly, rubbing circles into Liam's back. "He loves you so much."

Zayn burst out of the restaurant doors right then, spotting Liam and Louis and quickly striding over. 

"Think about what you say." Louis warned, and Zayn hesitated and took a deep breath before speaking.

"Liam." He started. "I love you. More than anything. And I wouldn't give it up for nothing, all right? I wouldn't be going to California if I didn't think we had an actual shot at this. I know we can do this, please, understand that. And I--" Zayn stopped, sighing, and stepped forward to grab Liam's hands in his own. "I want you to come with me. Please? There's so many opportunities for you out there. You can get an agent? You can work professionally? Teach? Please, Liam, I just want you there with me."

Liam stared at Zayn, shocked but a bit wonderstruck. "I…Zayn, I don't…"

"Liam." Zayn said, stepping even closer so that his forehead was pressed against Liam's. "Please."

There was a long pause before Liam spoke. "Okay." He nodded. "Okay. Okay, yeah, I--I'll have to talk to my folks, but, yeah, I'll come? I'll try. Zayn, I just--I love you."

Zayn wrapped Liam into a hug, whispering about how much he loved Liam, and it looked so intimate that Louis felt like he was interrupting something, so he quietly slipped back into the restaurant. 

As soon as he walked in, his eyes found his table, where Niall was sitting awkwardly, trying not to watch Harry and Cher coo over each other with a look of disgust on his face. The rage he'd felt earlier suddenly swept over him and he stormed over to the group. Niall saw him and gave a half-hearted wave, frowning a bit when Louis didn't respond, then raising his eyebrows as he guessed Louis' intentions. 

Louis approached the side of the booth where Cher was sitting, practically grinding onto Harry's lap by now, and grabbed a handful of her horrid pink shirt, pulling her up and off of Harry in one swift movement. She let out a cry of surprise and pain and then huffed off, muttering something about Louis being a complete psycho, but Louis could have not cared any less.

He looked at Harry, who met Louis' eyes for the first time in weeks, his jaw clenched. Louis got a handful of Harry's shirt and pulled him up, surprising them both for a moment at his newfound strength, before setting him down in front of him. He had to look up to meet Harry's eyes, but he was so angry, so goddamn pissed that he managed to glare at Harry with confidence.

"How dare you." He spat out, shoving Harry back a bit. Harry stumbled, surprised, but caught himself, shooting a deathly look back at Louis.

"How dare I?" He mocked, smirking. "You tell me who kept us apart, Louis. You tell me who made this decision."

"You can't leave like this."

"Says who? Says you?! Who the fuck are you to be ordering me around like this, Louis? You're not my boyfriend. Hell, you're not even my friend. You're just a pathetic, spineless asshole who doesn't know love when it's staring him right in the face."

Louis froze at the mention of the l-word, blinking back tears as he looked at Harry. Before he knew what he was doing, he'd raised his hand and brought it down sharply against Harry's cheek.

The slap rung through the restaurant, which had grown silent over the last couple of minutes as the diners had watched the fight unfold.

Louis stared at his hand in shock, looking up to Harry, who was cupping his cheek and staring at Louis with just as much surprise on his face. Niall's jaw was on the floor, his eyes darting between the two of them.

"I--" Louis began, then swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. "Fuck." He said, turning and bolting out of the restaurant, passed a startled Liam and Zayn, and Niall was quick to follow.

------------

Louis refused to talk to Liam and Niall about Harry. He'd ignore them whenever they brought him up, and focused instead on his dancing, spending long nights at the studio. His mother gave him worried looks when he came home, pulling him into long hugs. Louis was sick of school, sick of grades and tests and all that other unnecessary shit, and he felt the last couple weeks of school fly by. He found himself in an auditorium not soon after, gulping as he crossed the stage to accept his diploma, smiling with his mouth, but not with his eyes.

The next big thing was Louis' senior performance, his final dance at his studio under his teacher's instruction. He spent hours dancing, bruises blooming over his skin but soon forgotten as he ran through his routine in his mind, determined to be able to do it with his eyes closed. He even practiced it like that a couple times, almost crashing into the studio mirrors in the process, and Alina immediately brought that to a stop.

It was scheduled for a Thursday night, and Louis could feel the adrenaline tingling through his veins. Liam had already performed earlier in the week, and Zayn, Niall, and Louis had all shown up, cheering loudly every time they could. He peeked out into the audience and saw his family sitting in the same row as the three other boys, all of them talking and laughing. He didn't see the one face he wanted to see, the face he'd slapped and ran away from, the face he dreamed about kissing every night, but that didn't matter, because all he needed were the people who were here for him now.

Alina grabbed him before he went on, pressing kisses to both his cheeks, and Perrie grinned at his blush. 

"Shut up." Louis mumbled, placing his hands on Perrie's waist and getting into his starting position as the curtain rose and the volume of the crowd died down, a soft, tinkling piano beginning to play.

Louis breathed deeply and began moving, his mind not even processing anything his body was doing. He just tried to focus on the music and Perrie, watching her movements so that he'd be in sync with her, never missing a beat, even if she slipped up--which, of course, she didn't. In fact, the whole routine went smoothly, even better than expected, and Louis couldn't stop grinning at the thunderous applause that followed their performance, winking at his friends and family, who were excitedly hollering in the audience. 

He walked off stage, hugging Perrie excitedly, and Alina quickly pulled him aside. "Louis. Some people want to meet you."

Louis gave her a confused look but followed her anyway, realization hitting him as soon as he saw two very smartly-dressed people with clipboards and folders in front of him.

"This is Louis Tomlinson." Alina spoke, gently nudging him in the ribs.

"Oh. Uh, yes. Hello!" Louis said, trying to calm his racing heart. "Hi. Um, did you, uh, enjoy the performance?"

"Oh, yes, it was wonderful." One of the people said, a short woman with deep maroon lips. The tall man next to her nodded in agreement.

"We're from the Juilliard School of Dance," he began, and Louis froze, his heart pounding in his chest even though he couldn't breathe. Alina seemed to notice, though, and she wrapped an arm around his shoulders comfortingly until Louis inhaled again.

"Oh." Louis replied.

"We've heard a lot about you, you know, from Alina, who is an alumni of the school." The man continued. "And now I can see why."

"Oh." Louis said again, swallowing.

The woman smiled. "We'd like to offer you a scholarship, Louis, to our school. Would you be interested?"

"Oh?" Louis said, a third time, then snapped out of his daze. "Wow. Uh. Oh god, yes, of course, I've…I've dreamed about Juilliard since I was, like, 14, oh my god. Are--are you serious? Is this real? I'm not, like, being pranked, am I?"

The man and woman laughed, and so did Alina, who just pulled him closer. Louis felt a smile grow on his face, so wide that it hurt his cheeks after just a few seconds. 

He wasn't able to stop smiling for the rest of the conversation with the Juilliard representatives. He didn't stop when he opened his dressing room door and saw everyone crammed inside, popping champagne bottles and hugging and kissing his cheeks. He didn't stop when he slipped into bed that night, heart racing from the day's events.

In fact, he didn't even stop smiling all through the night, his dreams filled with ballet and champagne and a tall stranger with chocolate curls and emerald eyes.

He woke up the next morning with a bit of a hangover, but perked up immediately over his cuppa, waltzing around the kitchen with his sisters, singing a made-up tune about going to Juilliard. 

"What're your plans for the rest of the day, sweetie?" His mom asked, and Louis shrugs. 

"Who knows? I'm a free man!" He cried, suddenly dipping Lottie, who let out a surprised squeal and clung to his arms. She smacked him on the arm when he got her upright again and herded her sisters upstairs to get ready for school. Louis rolled his eyes and walked over to hug his mom.

"It was nice of your friends to come last night." She said, and Louis smiled.

"I know. I love those three so much."

"Three?" Jay said, cocking her head, confused. "There were four of them there."

Louis froze. "What?"

"Yeah. Liam and Niall and the other boy--Zayn, right?--were in our row, but there was a boy in the back. He came up to us at the end of the show and introduced himself, but he didn't come into your dressing room."

"What did he look like?" Louis whispered.

"Um. A bit taller than you, I'd say. Skinny, for sure. Mess of curls on his head. Brown hair, green eyes? Sound familiar?" She asked, combing her fingers through his hair.

"Harry," Louis inadvertently whispered, and Jay smiled.

"Yeah, that was it. Nice lad. Thought I caught a flash of a tongue ring when we spoke, though. Bit freaky."

Louis nodded absentmindedly as his mom let go of him.

"Oh. Right! I almost forgot. All the girls have after-school things today, and I'm working late, so we won't be back till about 9 o'clock. Think you can manage?"

Louis shook himself a bit and smirked. "I'll try my hardest not to ruin everything."

"No house parties!" His mom said over her shoulder as she walked out of the room, chuckling to herself.

Louis went upstairs and laid down on his bed, staring at the ceiling.

Harry had been there. He'd come to his recital.

Louis didn't know why, but he started crying, and he let the tears fall across his cheeks as he continued to stare at nothing, wondering why Harry had shown up and why he had to exist at all.

The house was empty soon after, with everyone gone to work and school, and Louis just lounged around the house for the rest of the day, pigging out on junk food and watching a few crap movies before he glanced at the clock and saw that it was already 7PM. He sighed and made to go to the kitchen, thinking he'd whip himself up a quick meal of noodles or something before taking a shower, but the doorbell stopped him.

Louis frowned. No one was supposed to come over. Who'd be there at 7 on a Friday night?

He shuffled over to the door, not even bothering to look through the peephole, and practically gasped when he saw Harry in front of him.

"Hi." Harry said, almost sheepishly, and Louis wanted to slap him again, just for that, before he saw the fading pink mark still on Harry's cheek.

"Um…hi?" Louis said.

"Can I come in?"

"Oh. Sure." Louis moved to the side, closing the door behind Harry. The two stood in the foyer, both staring at the ground for a couple minutes before Harry spoke up.

"I'm not sorry, Louis."

Louis looked up at him, surprised, his mouth settling into a tight line. "And I should be?"

Harry shook his head. "No. But if you want me to apologize, I won't. I don't regret these past few months."

"Why would you? You must be feeling great, considering all the sex you've been having."

Harry narrowed his eyes at Louis. "Don't be a dick."

Louis let out a dark laugh. "Pot calling the kettle black."

"We both have things to apologize for. But I think we're both too stubborn to do so."

"Maybe." Louis shrugged. 

"No. Definitely. For example." Harry said, stepping closer to Louis and picking up his hand. "How about this?" He placed Louis' palm on his cheek, fitting it to the mark there, and Louis blushed, but stood his ground.

"I'm not sorry about that."

"Told you so."

Louis huffed out a frustrated breath. "I heard you were at my senior performance."

"Oh. Uh, yeah."

"Did you like it?" Louis said, looking down to the floor as he curled his toes.

"Louis, you were amazing. I've never seen anyone move like that, I was blown away, I--"

"Thanks." Louis said, cutting him off. He sighed. "Harry, why are you here? What are we doing?"

"I'm leaving tonight." Harry blurted out, looking at Louis.

"Oh." Louis said, gulping. "Zayn too?"

Harry nodded. "And the rest of the band. Our flight's at midnight. First class. Perks of being in Zayn's band, I guess."

"I'm going to Juilliard." Louis said. "I mean, probably. Hopefully. I got a scholarship last night."

"Oh. Wow, Louis, that's great."

"Yeah, I know. Fucking future, huh? Who knows where we'll be in five years?"

"I don't care." Harry said, hesitating, but then stepping closer to Louis. "I care about where we are right now."

"Oh? And where's that?" Louis replied, his breath hitching as Harry came closer and closer until their lips were barely brushing against each other.

"Right here. With you." Harry whispered, closing the distance between them as he leaned in to catch Louis in a kiss. It was only then that Louis realized that his hand was still on Harry's face, Harry's hand covering his. He didn't pull away, though, even though his head was screaming for him to do so. He pushed into the kiss instead, wrapping his arms around Harry's neck as Harry slipped his hands around Louis' waist. 

It'd been so long since Louis had been kissed by Harry, and he let himself melt into the feeling, sighing happily as Harry broke off the kiss.

"Bedroom?" He mumbled, and Louis grabbed his arm and pulled him up the stairs.

They fell onto Louis' bed, completely intertwined. Louis felt guilty for a moment after realizing how messy his room was, but that thought was soon pushed out of his mind as Harry worked his tongue into Louis' mouth. 

They kissed slowly, bodies interlocked, and when they stopped, their faces were an identical shade of pink. Louis squirmed a bit and found that he was already hard. God, just kissing Harry turned him on this much. His movement didn't go unnoticed and Harry untangled himself from Louis to peel off his clothes. Louis stared at him for a moment before realizing that he should be doing the same, and he hastily shoved everything off. He moved backwards till his head was resting on the pillows, his breath hitching as Harry slowly crawled over him, taking him all in.

Harry slowly kissed a trail up from his bellybutton to his neck, and Louis shivered as Harry traced his jawline, turning into the touch. Harry slowly brought himself down so all his weight was on top of Louis, practically enveloping him. Louis moaned as their cocks brushed and he brought his arms around Harry's neck as they started to kiss again.

Harry ground his hips into Louis, their cocks hardening against each other, and Louis couldn't even make out who was making which noise as Harry moved faster, biting Louis' collarbone. Harry paused after a little while and Louis read his mind, motioning over to his nightstand.

"Second drawer," he said quietly, and Harry wordlessly pulled out a condom and lube.

Louis stared at the items as Harry placed them to the side, and bit his lip. "Harry, do you--I mean, I know you've been, um, sleeping with a lot of people, but do you know if, you're, uh, y'know…?"

Harry gave him a curious look. "I'm clean, if that's what you're asking." He said.

Louis let out a ragged breath. "Then do you--you don't have to, y'know, if you don't want to." Louis said quickly, blushing a bit, indicating the condom.

Harry's eyes widened but he nodded. "Fuck, Louis, fuck." He leaned down and caught Louis in a kiss, running his tongue over Louis' bruised lip. "Yes."

Louis shuddered and kissed Harry back ferociously, cock twitching at the thought of barebacking. He'd never done it before, and from Harry's reaction, it didn't seem like the other boy had either. He pushed into the kiss, working into Harry's mouth with his tongue, hissing as Harry gently pressed a slick fingertip to his entrance. Harry pushed in slowly, working himself all the way in. He waited till Louis had adjusted and then added a second finger, moving a bit faster.

"Go slow," Louis rushed out, biting his lip. "It's been a while."

Harry froze, and Louis' eyes shot open to see a wave of guilt sweep over Harry's face. "I--" he began, brow furrowing. "You haven't…um, since we…?"

Louis slowly shook his head, frowning. Did Harry think Louis was sleeping with someone else? Was that why he'd started the whole chain of fuck buddies? "Harry, what did--" he began, but Harry leaned forward and kissed him, rough, and Louis moaned into it, hips rutting up as Harry pushed two fingers in and out of him. He pulled them out, wiping them on the sheets, positioned himself at Louis' entrance, rubbing his stud at Louis' hole, kissing a slow line around Louis' neck. Louis sighed and Harry worked his way in, getting about halfway until he pulled out and entered again. He ground into Louis when he bottomed out, their chests pressed together. 

"I'm so sorry, Louis," he whispered, so quietly that Louis almost missed it. "I--I thought there was someone else and so I…"

Louis pressed a finger to Harry's lips and shook his head. "No. Me, Harry, I…it was terrible seeing you with someone else every day but at least I got to see you, and now…" Louis closed his eyes, trying to hold back tears, and Harry kissed his finger, slowly taking it into his mouth. Louis bucked his hips and groaned as Harry took in another one of his fingers, working his tongue around them expertly, and Louis could feel his erection pressing against both of them in between their bodies. Harry was still just grinding, pulling out a bit every once in a while and circling his hips back in.

It was all too much, too close, too personal. They'd never had sex like this, so slow, so passionate, and Louis bit his tongue because this is all he'd wanted and now Harry was going, leaving, and they'd probably never even see each other again. He couldn't do it like this, pressed against every inch of Harry, feeling everything the other boy was going through.

"Stop." He whispered, and Harry looked at him, confused, gently pulling out.

"Louis, I--" Harry began.

"No. No more…no more talking, I can't do it like this." Louis said, reaching up and pushing Harry over so he was lying on his back. Louis had to feel Harry, but nothing more than just his cock. He didn't want to feel Harry's heartbeat against his, didn't want to shiver against his lips. Louis straddled Harry on his knees, letting Harry's length rub against his entrance, sighing as the cool metal of his barbell touched his skin, so hot with sweat and lust and Harry. 

He sank down all the way, causing both him and Harry to gasp as his hips met the other boy's. Harry's hands traveled up Louis' thighs to rest on his waist and Louis lifted himself up slowly, pushing himself back down. He repeated this a couple more times and then sped up, leaning forward, hands pressing into Harry's collarbones. "Fuck," he breathed out, hearing the sound of skin hitting skin as he moved.

Harry was still for a while, taking in ragged breaths, unable to take his eyes off of Louis' face, but then he started lifting his hips up to meet Louis', and Louis' eyes rolled back as Harry's piercing hit his prostate. He moaned low but kept moving, matching all of Harry's thrusts, the pleasure building up inside him.

Harry noticed and brought one of his hands down to Louis' cock, stroking gently, and Louis shuddered as Harry worked over him once, twice, and then he was coming over Harry's chest, unable to breathe as he spilled out onto him. Harry grunted and continued pushing himself into Louis for another minute and then he was coming too, burying himself deep inside Louis, who could do nothing but support himself on Harry, arms quivering.

Harry reached over and slowly worked himself out of Louis, gently bringing the boy to lay down next to him. His lips were all over Louis, kissing, biting, and Louis grabbed his jaw and kissed him, hard, pouring all the pain and hurt of the past few months into it. Harry looked a bit dazed when Louis pulled back, and Louis couldn't meet his eyes. Instead his gaze flickered over to his alarm clock, which shone a bright "8:30 PM" in the darkness.

"My family's gonna be home soon." Louis whispered, stroking Harry's hair even though he knew he shouldn't.

"I have to get my stuff and go to the airport." Harry replied just as quietly, and the two lay silent for a moment before Harry spoke up.  "I…I know we're going to have almost a whole country between us, Louis, but…"

"Don't." Louis said, shaking his head.

"You still can't?" Harry said, mouth turning into a tight line. "Why?"

"I told you, in the past--"

"We all have pasts, Louis. We all fuck up. We all get fucked up. Why the hell does it matter?"

Louis' hands stopped working through Harry's hair, instead settling into small fists on Harry's chest. "Because it almost ruined the people I care about." He said, and Harry looked devastated.

"Do you not care about me?"

Louis' eyes shot up to Harry's and he didn't know what to say. 

Harry bit his lip and nodded. "I…okay. Wow." He turned and got out of Louis' bed, standing up and yanking his clothes back on. He was a complete mess, flushed and sweaty, Louis' come dried on his stomach, but he seemed to pay no attention to any of that, just focused on dressing himself as quickly as possible.

"Harry, wait, no, I--" Louis cried, scrambling out of the bed to grab Harry's arm. "I do care about you, a lot, I just--"

"Yeah?" Harry said, scoffing. "Well, fuck, Louis, I love you!" Harry shouted at him, eyes blazing, then immediately turning wide as he realized what he'd said. "Shit. Shit. I have to go."

Louis watched Harry run out of his bedroom, still shocked, then grabbed a pair of sweatpants and pulling them on as he followed Harry down to the foyer. "Harry! Stop, please, Harry!"

But Harry ignored him, pulling open the front door and letting the cool night air hit both him and Louis. He hesitated, closing his eyes and exhaling deeply. "Bye, Louis." He almost whispers, slamming the door behind him.

Louis stood there, not moving as he heard the screech of Harry's tires as the other boy sped away. He didn't budge until he heard his mother's car pull into the driveway, and then he bolted into his room, slamming and locking the door behind him. He sunk down to the floor, sobbing into his arms, wondering what the hell his life had become.

------------

Louis' phone was off.

Actually, he wasn't sure when he last had it on.

He hadn't said goodbye to Liam or Zayn when they'd left, and when he reluctantly switched his mobile on a few days later, there were more than a hundred texts and missed calls from the three of them.

But none from Harry.

------------

Louis heard his browser ping and automatically clicked on the unread email, yelling when he opened it up. His mother ran into his room, along with his sisters, as Louis pointed to the screen, unable to say a word. They all leaned close to the screen, and his mother started screaming first, leaning down to wrap him into a huge hug. Lottie and Fizzy joined next, and the twins jumped around, unsure of what exactly they were celebrating. 

"What's going on?" Daisy asked, smiling wide.

Louis grinned back just as enthusiastic, sweeping his two youngest sisters into a hug. 

"Juilliard." He said, and laughed when they gave cheers of congratulations. He turned and saw Fizzy and Lottie jumping on his bed, whooping wildly, and just as he was about to scold them for it, his mother laughed and joined them. Louis stared, a bit shocked, and Daisy and Phoebe climbed onto his bed as well, till everyone was screaming and bouncing.

Louis' eyes shone with tears but he couldn't stop smiling at the sight in front of him. "You're all bloody mental!" He cried, but pushed himself off of the chair and stepped onto his bed, laughing.

He called Niall first, a bit breathless after having to wrestle himself out from a pile of hyper females who'd draped themselves all over him.

"Hello?" Niall answered, a bit wary.

"Nialler!" Louis said happily, ignoring the small part of him that was reminding him why Niall was acting so apprehensive. "I have some good news and some bad news and some possibly better news."

Niall seemed to relax a bit at Louis' cheerful tone, and chuckled. "All right. Tell me. In that order." 

"Okay. So, good news: I got into Juilliard. With the scholarship. So…I'll be going there in the fall?"

"Jesus, Louis! Congrats!"

"Bad news: it's in New York. So I'll be leaving."

"Not now, though?"

"No, no, but definitely in a couple months, because I'm going to need a bit to settle in and everything, y'know?"

"Yeah, okay. So what's the possibly better news?"

"I want you to come with me."

"Oh."

"Okay, hear me out. I know you haven't really applied anywhere, and I was just thinking that, well, New York has so many opportunities and--"

"Louis." 

"Um. Yeah?"

"Did I tell you I got into my first-choice school?"

"…oh."

"Yeah."

"Oh, okay. For what?"

"Music Business."

"Whoa, Niall, really? I didn't even really know that you were looking into that…"

"Who do you think was booking all of One Direction's gigs?"

"Well, damn."

"I know, right?"

"So, um, good for you."

"Louis."

"Yeah?"

"You never asked where."

"Where what?"

"Where I'm going."

"Oh. Uh, where are you going?"

"NYU."

"…what?!" 

Niall laughed. "Yeah."

"You wanker!" Louis replied.

"Yeah, a bit."

------------

Louis and Niall moved to New York together at the end of the summer, with Louis' entire family coming up to spend a weekend with them as they got situated into their dorms. 

Louis was in Juilliard's dorms and Niall was in NYU's, but they were only around 15 minutes apart so they spent the rest of the month alternating staying in each other's rooms, which annoyed their roommates, although neither Louis nor Niall seemed to care.

And then school started.

In the beginning, it was fine. The first month of classes was like the last month of summer. 

Then Louis' practices started getting longer and Niall's courses started getting harder. And before either of them knew it, it had been a couple months since they'd hung out.

They ran into each other a party at around that time, awkwardly staring at each other for about a minute before Niall walked up to Louis and hugged him, so intense that Louis almost fell backwards before he reciprocated the action. The rest of the night was a blur of catching up over weed and booze, with both of them promising to keep in touch.

That didn't happen.

Louis caught a glimpse of Niall around campus sometimes--Niall had several friends in Juilliard's music school--and he thought he saw Niall in a Whole Foods once, too. By their sophomore year, Louis avoided Niall whenever he managed to see him, because he didn't want to have to sit through catching-up and old times when those were the last things on his mind. 

It hurt him, badly, because Niall used to be his best friend, and he'd done so much for Louis in the past that Louis owed him a good friendship. But he couldn't bring himself to walk up to the blonde and say hi, or ruffle his hair and pinch his side like he always used to. Louis had other friends now, friends who he didn't owe anything to, friends who didn't expect him to tell them his fucked-up life story.

So Louis didn't talk to Niall.

In fact, Louis doesn't talk to Niall for the next five years.

------------

------------

It's 5 AM and Louis is up, but he has absolutely no idea why. He blinks a couple times, staring up at the ceiling, and then drags himself out of bed. He doesn't have to get to the company till 7, so he's up a full hour before his alarm's going to go off. He stumbles to the kitchen, scratching his stomach a bit, and makes himself a cuppa, walking out onto the balcony to drink it. He hears a bit of bustling in the kitchen and walks back in to see Eleanor up, already frying some eggs in a pan.

"Morning, Lou!" She chimes, smiling at him. "Eggs?"

"Morning, El," Louis replies, smiling back. "Yes, please."

Louis met Eleanor at the auditions for their ballet company, when they were paired together to perform a piece neither of them had known. The piece was, for a lack of a better term, intimate, and though Louis had no problem keeping his boner down, Eleanor, apparently, did not, and had spent the next few months practically stalking Louis until he'd had to sit her down in a cafe and come out to her. Eleanor seemed heartbroken but shook it off, still keeping in contact with Louis, and when they'd both received positions as junior dancers, he figured that she was his best bet for a roommate.

He still thinks that she has a bit of a crush on him by the way she watches him sometimes, especially when he's got his shirt off, which just so happens to be right now. Louis rolls his eyes but lets her look, striking a pose as she slides a plate of eggs and toast over to him.

"I can't help it if you're pretty." She says, winking at him. 

Louis snorts but blushes a bit, digging into his food.

They leave a bit early, considering that they're both up, and stop at Starbucks before heading over to their studio. 

They're warming up with some of the other dancers when someone unplugs Louis' iPod, which had been playing some calming classical music, to put on some poppy rock song.

"Hey!" Louis cries out in protest but his words are drowned out by the cheers and squeals that pop up from all over the room.

"Don't get your panties in a bunch, Tommo." Danielle, one of the other dancers, says as she hands him his iPod. "It was a request by the majority of the room."

"Augh. Who even is this?"

"Are you serious?" Danielle asks, her eyebrows rising. "You've never heard of them?"

"Obviously not, Dani."

"Oh. They're this new band that's popped up over the last couple of months. Their single just hit #1."

"Good for them?"

Danielle rolled her eyes. "They're from your hometown."

"They're from--" Louis says, then stops as her words sinks in. He listens to the song a bit more closely and the vocalist sounds far too familiar. He gets up and runs over to the iPod, his heart beating wildly as he turns the screen on.

The song's called Kiss You, and Louis has to admit it's pretty catchy, but it's the band name he's looking for, and he drops Danielle's iPod onto the floor as he reads "One Direction" on the screen.

"Louis! What the fuck?" Danielle cries, picking it up and making sure it's not cracked. She looks up at Louis, pissed, but then her expression changes to one of concern as she notices how Louis has turned pale, his hands shaking. "…Lou? What's wrong?"

Louis can barely breathe as the song plays on, and he can't believe he didn't recognize Zayn's voice earlier. It's so fucking obvious, and Louis wants to slap himself for not noticing. Then another voice starts singing, harmonizing with Zayn's, and Louis' heart completely stops, because he's heard that voice before. 

He's heard it laugh, heard it tickle his ear, heard it moan his name. He's heard it say it loves him and then he's heard it whisper goodbye. He hasn't heard that voice in five years, and when the realization of everything hits him, it slams into him like a truck, and then everything goes black and Louis feels himself fall to the floor of the studio, Dani's voice crying out his name.

------------

Louis wakes up in his own bed, El fawning over him. She lets out a sigh of relief as he opens his eyes.

"Good, you're up." She says, smiling.

"Fuck, what happened?"

"You fainted. During warm-up."

"Shit."

"It's okay, they were worried it was an eating disorder, and then I brought up your ass and they didn't really have an argument for that, so."

"El!"

"I'm joking! Calm down! Okay, okay, so I've gotta go back now, but you've been ordered to rest for the rest of the day, all right, so don't try to come back to practice."

Louis is about to protest, about to tell El that he's fine and that he only fainted because he knew the band, but then he realizes that it would require him to tell her about everything that happened between him and the boys and that he couldn't tell the story without talking about Harry so he closes his mouth and nods solemnly.

When El's gone, Louis whips out his laptop and frantically types in "One Direction" into the search bar, eyes widening at the number of hits that pop up. He automatically goes to look at the image results and spends a whole minute just gaping at the first page of pictures. The boys look so much older, which Louis should've expected, but he's still not ready for how striking Zayn's cheekbones look when they're covered in stubble or how tall Harry's become, his arms covered with more tattoos. Harry's put his eyebrow and nose piercings back in, but he still has the same dimpled smile, and Louis practically melts into his pillow. 

He goes to YouTube next, and spends about two hours doing nothing but watching videos of them. Their interviews, concerts, candid moments, everything. He sees a compilation video and clicks on it, watching clips from all their live performances. One part of the video catches his eye and so he pauses it, wondering why everything seems so familiar. And then he realizes that it's a video of the first time Harry performed with the band, one warm night about five years ago, when Louis was jumping in the crowd, hugging his two best friends, heartbeat pumping with the bass.

It only takes a couple more clicks to find the whole video of that performance, and Louis shows up about halfway through the video. The person recording everything is right next to him and so Louis can hear himself screaming along, and watches himself bounce up and down. He looks so young and he bites his lip, watching how happily he's clinging on to Liam and Niall.

Louis doesn't know what comes over him, but he immediately picks up his phone and calls Niall's number.

He panics as he realizes what he's doing, which happens as the phone's ringing, but right before he's about to hang up, he hears Niall answer.

"…Louis?"

Louis inhales sharply and squeezes his eyes shut, pinching the bridge of his nose. Of course Niall would know who was calling, he had fucking caller ID, and Niall would never delete a number off his phone, especially not Louis'.

"Uh, hey, Niall." Louis says quietly, clearing his throat. "Hi."

"Wow." Niall says. "I thought you might've butt-dialed me. To what do I owe this honor?"

"Can't a guy just call up his best friend after five years?"

"I didn't know we were friends, let alone best ones."

Louis waits a moment to hear Niall's signature laugh, the one that shows that he's joking and just messing about, but Niall doesn't say anything, and Louis' heart sinks.

"Um. I fainted today."

"Oh?"

"Fuck. I mean, I'm calling you because I fainted today. Because of why I fainted today."

"And why's that?"

"I heard a song on someone's iPod."

"Yeah, I know, pretty cool inventions, those. Playing music out of a box. It's like magic."

"I heard Kiss You."

"…Oh. So?"

"I didn't…I didn't even know they had been signed, let alone that they're as popular as they are."

"And whose fault is that?"

"Well, I mean, how come no one told me?"

"Told you? Lou, are you fucking kidding me? Liam, Zayn, and I tried to contact you for ages and you just kept ignoring us. They told me you wouldn't answer them so I tried to get in touch with you but you avoided me. Me. I saw you see me all the time and then just turn around and walk away without saying anything, so I just gave up. After all the shit we've been through? You just go and ignore us like that? Does it really come as any fucking surprise that this is how you found out about the boys?"

Louis' breath hitches and he realizes that he's crying now, and he takes a ragged breath. "Niall, I…I couldn't see you. Seeing you reminded me of everything, and I just wanted a fresh start here."

"That is the worst excuse I've ever heard."

"I wouldn't be calling you if I wasn't sorry." Louis said quietly. "And I am. Sorry, I mean."

Niall sighs and doesn't say anything for a little bit. Louis is almost afraid he's hung up on him when he speaks up again. "So why are you really calling me, Lou?"

"I…they're popular, Niall. Like, really popular."

"I know. I manage them."

"…what?"

"How do you think they suddenly got a record deal after four years of nothing? A bunch of little twats, they were."

"Just sprinkled a bit of the 'ol Nialler magic onto them, huh?"

"You know it." Niall said, laughing, then catching himself. "Fuck. I'm supposed to be mad at you, Louis."

Louis smiled, biting his lip. "Sorry."

"Okay. So...what if they're popular?"

"I need…closure, I guess? I can't keep fainting every time I hear their songs or see their faces."

"Closure?"

"I have to apologize to them. To all of them, Niall. I think that's the only way I'll be okay. Otherwise I'm going to be collapsing all over New York."

Niall takes a deep breath. "Okay. Okay, yeah, I guess I can do that. We're, uh, we're actually coming to New York soon. All of us."

Louis sits up. "How soon is 'soon'?"

"…we're in New York right now?"

"Shit, Niall!"

"Do you wanna meet up for drinks tonight?"

"Yes. God, yes, please."

------------

Louis shows up a bit early to the bar, figuring that he has to be at least a bit buzzed to not want to throw himself off of a cliff when he sees the guys. He decided to wear a bit of a throwback outfit, dark red pants rolled up at the cuffs and a short-sleeved white button-down, and he hopes it fits the dress code of what the rest of the boys wear. The last thing he needs is more reasons to feel like an outsider.

"Can I get a beer?" He asks the bartender, and hands over the money needed. He takes his drink and finds an empty booth in the corner, feeling  a pang of nostalgia as he remembers the booth they all sat in for dinner every week ages ago. He chews his lip and sits down, taking a long swig of his drink.

He can hear when the guys walk in, because it's almost as if the entire bar stops breathing at the sight of them, and Louis can't blame them. He's sure everyone else is staring at them because of their fame, but Louis is just aghast at how different everyone looks. 

Niall's grown almost all the blonde out of his hair, his brown roots displayed freely, the tips of his hair still a light blonde. He smiles when he sees Louis, those damn clear braces finally off his teeth.

Liam lights up at the sight of Louis, and Louis gasps at him. He still has the same warm brown eyes, but his hair's almost completely shorn off, the soft wavy locks gone. His hair's longer in the front and slightly gelled up, and Louis almost chokes when he sees the ink on his forearms, because Liam and tattoos are never two things Louis would've connected together.

Zayn is right behind Liam, but still smiling, his hand in Liam's. He looked like all the photos Louis'd seen of him earlier, but his hair is a bit shorter and without that horrendous blonde streak that'd graced his head in some of the pictures online, thank god.

Louis pauses before he looks past Zayn, but all the air whooshes out of his lungs when he does, because Harry's there, and he looks gorgeous. Amazing. Fantastic. Louis doesn't think he has enough adjectives to describe how wonderful Harry looks, and he's wearing a tight pair of black leather pants and a loose white shirt whose collar is low enough for his tattoos to peek through. Even he gives Louis a small smile, and it's at that smile that Louis bursts out into a wide grin.

"Boys," Louis says, and then Liam has got him in a deathly grip, crushing his ribs with a huge hug. Niall slips in so that the three of them are wrapped around each other, just like old times, and Louis breathes them in, feeling so perfectly at home. "Hi." He says, and Liam laughs, Niall grabbing Louis' face to give a wet, sloppy kiss to each side, cackling when Louis grimaces. 

Zayn is next, grabbing Louis arm and pulling him into a tight hug himself. "Good to see you, Lou." He says, his voice deeper than before but still just as rich, and Louis hugs him back just as tight.

"Congrats," he says, and Zayn just laughs.

Harry steps forward, and Louis doesn't know what to say, doesn't even know if he remembers how to move, but he doesn't have to because Harry's completely enveloped Louis in a bear hug. Louis feels his arms rise up of their own accord and wrap around Harry's neck, just like they used to, and the two stand like that for what's probably a bit of a long time for a hug, but Louis doesn't care. It gives him more time to feel Harry's skin against his, to feel his cologne tickling his nostrils. It isn't until someone clears their throat that the two break apart, Louis blushing a bit as Harry smiles. "Hi." He says, and Louis blinks a few times like a complete idiot before replying.

"Hi."

Once everyone has a drink in front of them, the conversation starts to flow, and it's almost like nothing's changed between the five of them. Louis knows the other four probably hang out together quite often now, but he's happy to see that they can all pick up right where they left off. Harry is so involved in the conversation that Louis is too surprised to laugh when Harry tells a joke, hoping no one notices. Even Niall and Liam are getting along with Harry, not showing any of the cold distance they'd tried to create with him years ago.

"You okay, Lou?" Niall asks, bumping elbows with him. Louis looks up at his concerned face and smiles.

"Yeah. I really am." He says, and Niall smiles back, clearing his throat.

"Okay, boys!" Niall cries, drawing four sets of eyes onto him. "Louis has an announcement."

Louis gives Niall a confused look and then rolls his eyes when he realizes what Niall means. He sighs. "Okay, yeah, I guess I do." He clears his throat. "Basically…I'm sorry I was a twat."

Niall and Liam both raise their glasses to that, and Louis flips them off, making them smile.

"I was an idiot. It was a new place and I was scared to keep in touch because I was afraid that we'd all lose touch with each other, which sounds really stupid now, I know, but it didn't when I was a worried freshman in New York City, y'know? I thought if I just cut off ties with all of you everything would be fine, but I obviously never thought about what would happen if I saw any of you ever again, which was really stupid of me, and it obviously wasn't very pretty when it happened."

"Louis fainted when he heard Kiss You." Niall explains, and the other three boys laugh.

"You serious?" Zayn asks, smiling. "I mean, I know we're good, but…"

"You're an ass." Louis replies, sticking his tongue out.

"Vain Zayn, we call him." Liam agrees, and Zayn frowns at him, rolling his eyes.

"Point is, he fainted as soon as he heard Zayn's voice." Niall says.

"Harry's voice." Louis corrects quickly, without thinking, and then blushes deep, taking a sip of his beer. 

The table has grown awkwardly silent, with Liam and Niall exchanging a look like they've always done, and Louis glances over at Harry to see that he's frowning, staring down at the table.

"Memories, huh?" Zayn says, wiggling his eyebrows, and Liam elbows him in the side, frowning. Harry is scowling at Zayn too, and Louis' brow furrows.

"What do you mean?" He asks, his blood pumping fast, because he knows exactly what Zayn means, and he's terrified because now is not the time to bring it up, now is not the time to talk about any of this.

"Y'know, you and Harry." Zayn says, taking another swig of his beer. He pushes Liam away when Liam elbows him again. "Oh, fuck off, Liam! It's not like all of us didn't know."

Louis' cheeks are burning now, and he doesn't even want to think about how red they are. "It was nothing." He finds himself saying, which he knows is a mistake as soon as he sees Harry look up at him, furious. 

"Er…" Niall says, glancing between the two of them, trying to ease the tension. 

"Yeah, nothing." Harry says bitterly, surprising Louis. "Just a quick dozen shags between two friends. Doesn't mean anything, really."

"God, shut up, Harry!" Louis says, fists clenched as tight as his jaw. 

"Whoa, how deep does this go?" Zayn asks, eyebrows rising. "I thought…I just thought it was that one night at my party, the first one Harry came to, but…"

"Oh, no, Zayn, it was almost all your parties." Harry says, way too sweetly, and Louis grinds his teeth together.

"Yeah," Louis adds. "Every party until Harry turned into a little slut."

"Guys--" Liam starts, but Harry turns to him, eyes blazing.

"Don't you fucking say anything. It's all your fault, anyway."

Liam looks at Harry, confused. "What? What're you talking about?"

"You're the one--you and Niall--" Harry says, his tone venomous, "that didn't give him permission. That didn't think I was good enough for their precious fucking Louis."

Zayn looks between Liam and Harry, his mouth settling into a tight line. "Liam, what is he talking about?"

Liam's at a loss for words. "I--what? Harry, what are you talking about?"

"You told Louis I was off-limits. Why? Because of the way I looked? Because Niall lived close to me and I caught him watching me sometimes, frowning when I had people over?"

"Wh--oh my god." Liam says, running his hand through his hair. "Harry, that was ages ago, we didn't even know you back then--"

"Yeah. And who's to blame for that?" Harry said, sliding out of the booth and standing up, slamming his hands on the table. "Louis at least took the damn time to get to know me, you know that? You and Niall just kicked me to the curb. I hate talking to you two every day because you only started liking me once you had no choice but to talk to me." Harry throws a few bills down on the table. "Fuck you guys." He says, then stomps out of the bar.

Zayn watches him go and then turns to Liam. "You dick." He says, and he looks just as angry as Harry did, although Louis has no idea why.

"Zayn, I--"

"You knew how ruined he was when we left home, Liam. You saw him. He cried the entire flight and that's what it took to make you realize that he wasn't a bad person?"

"Wait, what?" Louis says, his voice quiet. "Harry did what?"

Zayn turns to look at Louis, his gaze becoming something a bit more sympathetic. "He didn't eat for a week. He was destroyed. He was sick and he looked and played so bad that after we met up with the record company, the guy we'd played for pulled me aside and told me that he'd sign us if kicked Harry out of the band. Fuck if I was gonna do that." He says. "He wouldn't tell us why, but…I knew he'd stopped at your house, Lou, before coming over to mine."

Zayn gets out of the booth, shrugging off Liam's hand, which has found its way onto his shoulder. "I was always angry at you, Louis, I guess, for, y'know, tearing him apart. But I guess it wasn't your fault." He says, eyes flashing over to Liam and Niall. "It was nice seeing you, Louis." He finishes, nodding to Louis, and then walking out of the bar.

Louis sits still, heart thumping at everything that'd just happened.

"Shit." Liam mutters, snapping Louis back to reality, and he frowns at the two boys sitting next to him.

"Nice to see you two are such good friends with Harry now. Good timing." He speaks curtly, putting his money on the table and walking out of the bar. He can hear Niall and Liam calling after him, but he turns for his apartment and runs the entire way, panting by the time he opens the door and runs into his bedroom, ignoring Eleanor's concerned looks. He slams the door and falls into his bed, emotions buzzing through his mind. He feels furious and sad and regretful and lonely all at once, and he yells at El when she opens the door. 

"Close the fucking door, Eleanor!" He screams, hearing her jump and close the door moments later. Louis regrets the words as soon as they come out of his mouth, because he knows they'll shatter her, but he's feeling a bit too fucked up to care at the moment.

He closes his eyes, trying to block out everything that happened tonight, clearing his mind of all the shit crammed into it at the moment. He falls asleep thinking of nothing but himself in on an empty stage, performing for an audience that doesn't exist.

------------

When Louis wakes up, he doesn't have a hangover, but he still feels like crap. His phone buzzes once, twice, and then three times in a row before he concedes and reaches for it. He scrolls through dozens texts from both Liam and Niall, but nothing from Harry--no surprise there. His phone buzzes again, but longer this time, and he answers it without thinking.

"Hello?"

"Um…Lou?" Liam's voice asks, and Louis frowns. "Did I wake you up?"

"Yes." Louis lies.

"Oh. Well…do you think you could buzz me in?"

"What are you talking about? Wait, are--are you outside my apartment right now?"

"Um…yeah?"

Louis gets out of bed and silently walks over to the front door of his apartment, buzzing Liam in before he realizes what he's doing. It's like he's on autopilot, and he just stares at his hand on the buzzer until he hears a knock at the door. He hears some shuffling behind him and turns around to see Eleanor walk up to the door and then freeze when she sees Louis.

He bites his lip at her red eyes and tight expression. "It's for me." He manages to say, and then scolds himself for how rude he sounds, because El's almost broken right now. He walks away from the door and pulls her into a hug.

He can feel Eleanor freeze up, because Louis never does this with her, but she relaxes an instant later and starts crying.

"I'm so sorry! I didn't know--" She begins, but Louis interrupts her. 

"El, stop it, I'm an asshole, all right? I had a shitty night but that was no reason to yell at you like that. I'm sorry, okay, babe?"

Eleanor nods against his chest and sighs when he pets her hair. There's another knock at the door and she pulls away from him, giving him a small smile.

"You gonna get that?" She asks.

Louis hesitates for a second. "Is that all right?"

Eleanor nods. "Yeah. Yeah, it's okay, you obviously have some…things you need to work out. Just…let me know if you need me, okay?"

Louis nods back and El disappears into her room again. He presses the heels of his hands into his eyes in frustration because he knows that he doesn't deserve to be friends with someone like her and he hears another knock at his door.

"For fuck's sake!" He cries, pulling open the door to a wide-eyed Liam, whose hand is raised and ready to knock again.

"Oh. Sorry." Liam says quietly, and then Louis notices that he's in the same clothes as he was in last night. Of course, Louis is too, but at least that's because he practically passed out. He steps aside and lets Liam enter his apartment.

"Walk of shame?" Louis quips, and frowns at Liam's furrowed brow.

"The opposite?" Liam offers, and then shakes his head. "I don't know. I just walked around for a while."

"How long is 'a while'?"

"You left the bar, and then Niall and I tried running after you, but you just…disappeared. We went back to the hotel but Zayn wouldn't let me into our room and Harry wouldn't talk to me or Niall and Niall had some business calls or whatever, so I just…walked."

"And how did you find out where I lived?"

Liam shrugs. "Niall had your address."

"What?"

"He's had it for ages, Louis. At least that's what he told me." Liam says, frowning.

"Then how come he never stopped by?" Louis says, crossing his arms over his chest defensively.

Liam rolls his eyes. "Please, Louis. Why would Niall ever think that you would want to talk to him after avoiding him for years?"

Louis opens his mouth to reply but then realizes that he has no good answer to Liam's question, and it was probably rhetorical anyways, so he shuts it just as fast.

"So why are you here?" Louis asks after a minute of silence, and then watches, amused and a bit annoyed, when Liam starts looking through his bookshelves. "Liam, what the hell are you doing?"

Liam doesn't answer him, just keeps looking through every row of books, stopping when his finger hits a wide worn cloth spine. He slowly pulls it out of the shelf, walking over to Louis and sitting down right next to him. Louis twitches, his head telling him to move away from Liam, but his gut is gluing him to the spot, so he doesn't move.

Liam puts the book on both their laps, slowly opening the cover to reveal a blank white page with a single photo pasted onto it. Louis bites his cheek as he realizes what Liam's picked out of the shelves, but he can't draw his eyes away from the worn-out photo of him and Liam as little boys, posing incredibly flamboyantly in their mom's clothes.

"God, we really were born that way, huh?" Liam says, and Louis can't help but smile as Liam continues to flip through the pages.

"This is a dirty trick." Louis says. "You're a lowlife. You kiss-ass. You're trying to make me forgive you. It won't work."

"Look at what great friends we were!" Liam continues to narrate, and Louis winces at his use of the past tense. "Such little brats. But always together."

Louis sighs in defeat. "Liam, what are you doing?"

"Brothers!" Liam cries dramatically, standing up and putting one foot on Louis' coffee table, sweeping his arms around in a grand fashion. "A bond solidified through love!"

Louis rolls his eyes but giggles, and that's when Liam looks down at him and smiles, winking cockily. He gets down on his knees and takes Louis' hands in his.

"Liam Payne, are you proposing to me?"

"No, you idiot. Shut up and listen."

Louis shakes his head but watches Liam smile again, his expression softer and more caring. He presses his thumbs into Louis' palms and speaks. "Louis. You were probably the first person I ever truly loved. And I love you so much. You know that. You're more than just a brother to me, you're…you're my other half. And being apart from you for so many years has killed me, okay? And I don't want to do that. I don't want us to lose touch again because you're afraid of people saying goodbye to you."

Louis narrows his eyes defensively but Liam cuts him off before he can speak.

"Look." Liam continues. "I know what you're going to say. And don't even try it. I'm here for two reasons. I'm here to reconcile with you--because it's been five years, Louis, five years--and I'm not having that anymore. And…I'm also here because I was wrong. About Harry."

Louis tries to pull his hands out of Liam's but the other boy holds on, his grip strong.

"I was so, so wrong. And so was Niall. He's so much more than we ever thought he was, Louis. We were terrible for acting the way we did and we were never able to apologize to Harry because you weren't there. But then when we tried to get you into the picture you just shut us out, and so we just kept on talking to him and being around him every day and slowly becoming best friends with him, adoring him completely, and our guilt was eating us up. He was always so nice to us, so sweet, even though he knew we'd always treated him like shit, and…okay, Niall and I know we've destroyed everything. But we love you. And we love Harry, too. And we just--we want you two to be together, please, because both of you deserve each other and you're so perfect for each other, and--"

"Shut up." Louis says, cutting Liam off, and Liam looks up to see Louis' eyes filled with tears. "Shut up."

"Louis--" Liam begins, but Louis yanks his hands out of Liam's grip and shoves him back so that he falls onto the carpet. 

"Do you know what it feels like to love someone so much--so much that you feel like your heart might burst from how happy you are when you're around them?"

Liam bites his lip and nods slowly, pushing himself back up off the floor.

"Good. I'm happy for you. Zayn is--he's great. Now. Tell me what you'd do if he made love to you, told you he loved you, and then ran away, without trying to contact you for five years?"

Liam's brow furrows in confusion, and then realization dawns on his features, and his expression crumples up into a mix of anger, sadness, and guilt.

"That's what Harry did. To me. The night you left."

"Lou--"

"If he had called me even once over the past five years, Liam, I would've found you all in a heartbeat. I know it was wrong to ignore you and Niall and even Zayn, but none of you three were the one person I really wanted to hear from, y'know?"

Liam nods and runs a hand through his hair, obviously stressed, and Louis kneels down so he's across from him, pulling Liam into a hug.

"I'm sorry." He mumbles into Liam's neck, and Liam laughs.

"I'm more sorry."

"Good. You should be." Louis says, and then the two laugh together, their hold on each other tightening. 

Louis keeps his arms around Liam when he speaks again. "All he ever wanted was approval from you and Niall, y'know. Because he knows how much you meant to me. Because of all the shit I got into. I told him I couldn't be with him if you two didn't like him, and--"

"Louis, what the hell are you getting at?"

Louis pulls back from Liam, confused. "I--you and Niall, you did so much for me when I fucked up with all those guys before, and you two got hurt, Liam, and I couldn't do anything with someone you said no to because I loved you two too much and you guys mean everything to me."

"That didn't stop you with Harry." Liam says, and Louis looks at the ground guiltily. 

"Yeah, I know, but--"

"Louis," Liam says, almost laughing, and Louis looks up at him. "Niall and I--we'd do anything for you. We'd torture ourselves every day if that's what it would take to protect you. You knew Harry was something different, Lou. I--I can't believe you let us two idiots stop you from getting him."

"I thought…I mean, you and Niall said--"

Liam rolls his eyes. "Louis, we were teenagers. We said 'out of bounds', do you think we meant it? Niall and I knew that you were going to break the rules, we knew that you were going to see Harry, and we were waiting to see how long it would take for you to tell us. And we didn't like him right then, of course, but if you'd stayed with him, we would've seen who he really was and what kind of person he really was, and we would've probably loved him as much as you. Except that…you never told us? And then Harry was bringing a new date to the table every week and we saw how angry you were and so we thought that he really was an ass and then the night we left he was just a complete and total disaster and Niall and I both knew that we had been terribly wrong and, oh god, I can't believe you actually listened to us, Louis, we would've never thought that you would do that, I mean--you're Louis! When do you listen to anyone?"

Louis just stares at Liam for a solid minute after he finishes speaking, his face blank.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" He says finally, and Liam can't help but smile.

"You should have talked to us."

"I should've--fuck, Liam! I--fuck! Goddamn fuck!"

"Quiet down, Lou, you'll wake the neighbors."

"Where the hell is my fucking phone?" Louis cries, and then presses the screen frantically, holding the phone to his ear. Liam gets up and leans his head on the other side of the phone.

"Hello?" Niall's groggy voice answers.

"Niall. Wake the fuck up."

"Louis?" Niall says, suddenly alert. "What's going on?"

"Hi Nialler!" Liam says.

"…Liam? What the fuck--"

"No. Shut up, Niall. Wait. Fuck. Okay. Where are Harry and Zayn?"

"Um…interviews? For most of the day. Then soundcheck. They have a concert tonight."

"Shit. Okay. Can you get tickets for that?"

Niall is silent for a bit and Liam falls back onto the couch, laughing hysterically.

"No." Niall says, in a monotonous voice. "I cannot. There is no way for me to get tickets to the One Direction concert."

"Oh." Louis says, sadly. "Oh, okay, I mean I thought--"

"Louis. You're a fucking idiot. I'm their fucking manager." Niall interrupts, and Louis blushes. "Of course I'm going to be at that goddamn concert, Christ."

"Niall, you should see his face, oh my god, he looks like a tomato--" Liam cries, and Louis pushes him flat onto the couch, sitting on his back, effectively muffling him. "Tomm-ato!" Liam manages to squeak out.

"I hate you. Both of you."

"Good." Niall and Liam say at the same time.

------------

"Shit, we're late. Shit, fuck, shit." Louis cries, swinging his bag over his shoulder as he jogs alongside Liam.

"When did you start cussing this much?" Liam teases, raising an eyebrow.

Louis chooses to ignore him and instead focuses on the venue ahead of him, light up bright and boldly displaying One Direction's name. Louis lets out a low whistle at the line of people waiting to get in. 

"Well, fuck." Louis says, coming to a stop. "We'll never make it in in time."

Liam rolls his eyes and grabs Louis' arm, pulling him to the front of the line. Louis expects the other patrons to yell in protest or shoot them angry glares, but instead they all squeal and jump a bit, clearly excited.

"Liam! Oh my god!" A voice cries.

"Is that Liam? Where? I want a photo!" Another chimes in.

"Liam, I love you! Ziam forever!" A third, suspiciously low voice yells.

Liam smiles and waves, shaking his head sadly at the extended Sharpies and photos being offered to him for autographs. "No time right now, guys. Sorry. We're running late. Stick around after the show and see, though, all right?"

It's Louis' turn to roll his eyes as all the people in line nod excitedly. "A bit of a celeb yourself, huh, Payne?"

"Perks of dating a member of 1D." Liam states. "Plus, SYTYCD doesn't hurt."

"Wait, what?"

Liam stops and looks at Louis. "So You Think You Can Dance.

"Well, yeah, I know that, but what about it?"

Liam hesitates and then frowns. "Louis, I've been a judge on it for like three years now."

Louis' jaw drops and he feels guilt surge through him. "Fuck, Liam, I--"

"…you really didn't know?" Liam says quietly, chewing his lip, and Louis can tell that he's hurting.

"I…I stopped watching it. A while back. It, uh, reminded me of you."

"You stopped watching one of your--our--favorite shows because you didn't even want to think of me?"

Louis slaps his hands onto his face and rubs vigorously. "Fuck, this is so fucked up, Liam, I'm so sorry, I--"

Liam sighs. "Wow, this, uh, this went a lot deeper than I thought. I figured that you at least stalked all of us, a little?"

"Not really?" Louis offers, looking down at his feet. "I googled One Direction for the first time just yesterday, so…"

"Oh my god. I thought you were lying about the whole Kiss You thing."

Louis shakes his head and Liam sighs again, putting a hand on Louis' shoulder.

"All right. You know what? Bygones. Okay? Let's…let's get to the guys and get over the big hurdles first, all right?"

Louis nods eagerly and follows Liam as the boy walks up to a solid brick of a man.

"Yo, Dave." He says, offering his hand, but the other man doesn't take it, instead just offering Liam a guilty look.

"You're not allowed in." Dave says, his voice deep and gravelly, and Louis watches as Liam just stares at the large man.

"Are you kidding me?" Liam manages to reply, and Dave shakes his head.

"Straight orders from Z. Sorry, man."

Just then, the door behind Dave is pulled open and the fans perched outside scream ridiculously until they realize that it's Niall. A few of them still continue to shout gleefully, and Niall waves at them before pulling Liam and Louis into the building.

"But Z said--" Dave begins, and Niall shoots him a dark look.

"Don't forget who your actual boss is, Dave." Niall says, almost growling, and Louis has to say that he's impressed at how quickly Dave nods and turns around. Niall turns to face Liam and Louis once the door's closed. "You two are late. I don't even know if the boys have time to talk to you before the show. But it's not like they're opening the doors right now either, so."

"Zayn might let Louis in." Liam offers quietly, and Niall shakes his head solemnly.

"Yeah, but Harry won't." He replies, and Louis gulps, blinking back tears as he exhales slowly.

"Fuck it. Let's just…let's just go watch the concert, okay? Maybe we'll catch them afterwards."

Niall and Liam nod in agreement, and then all three of them turn their heads as they hear some sounds coming from the end of the hall. They see Zayn and Harry step out of a room with the rest of the band, the smiles on everyone's faces disappearing as their gazes settle on the nervous trio in front of them.

"Well, isn't this a familiar sight?" Zayn says cockily, pursing his lips as he walks towards them, slowly. 

Niall rolls his eyes and Liam looks down, averting his eyes from Zayn. Louis just looks past the dark-skinned boy at Harry, who's seemed to find a very interesting something on the ceiling. 

"Don't be a dick, man." Niall says, crossing his arms and standing in front of Zayn. "Give us a chance to explain, all right?"

"No." Zayn retorts, narrowing his eyes. "Oh. And by the way, you're fired."

Niall sighs, exasperated. "You can't just fire me, Zayn. I have a contract."

"Yeah, well, then after the contract."

"You don't want to do that."

"No, you're wrong. I really do." Zayn quips, and smirks as Niall clenches his jaw. "Enjoy the show, boys." He says venomously, draping a protective arm around Harry and leading him onto the stage.

"C'mon." Niall says, and Liam and Louis follow him so that they're right off stage, watching as One Direction runs out onto the stage to an enormous hoard of screaming fans.

Zayn and the other boys are whooping loudly and jumping around, shaking hands and high-fiving everyone they can reach in the crowd, but Louis' eyes lock onto Harry, because he's smiling--and he hasn't seen Harry smile like that in years and years. Harry grabs his guitar and it's like he's the happiest guy in the world, and Louis clenches his hands into fists because he knows how much of a sick lie that is.

He stands there for the rest of the concert with Niall and Liam, silently watching as the boys sing song after song. The audience knows all the words, and everyone's having so much fun on stage that Louis is almost jealous. The boys run off to the other side of the stage for costume changes, and so none of them run into him, but Louis catches both Zayn and Harry glance over at them several times throughout the show.

At the end of the set, the crowd is still thrumming with energy and the band is still jumping around, not ready to leave yet. Zayn pulls the boys into a huddle after looking over at Louis again, smirking as he speaks and Louis sees Harry frown but nod hesitantly, flexing his fingers over the neck of his guitar.

"Okay, everybody!" Zayn yells, and the crowd goes wild. "We're going to end the show tonight with a very special song, one that's near and dear to all our hearts, I'm sure. It's a cover--" and then the audience screams even louder, causing Zayn to stick his tongue out at them. "It's a cover of a pretty famous song." He continues after a moment, and then unexpectedly turns so he's facing Liam, Louis, and Niall. "Hope you like it." He says, his grin sweet but his words dripping with contempt.

He turns to the band and he's counted in, and Harry starts playing the intro of the song.

It takes Louis all of five seconds to recognize the tune and he almost gasps at Zayn's nerve, making a promise to himself to slap the pretty off of Zayn's face the next chance he gets. 

Zayn's voice echoes perfectly through the auditorium.

He was a boy, and she was a girl, can I make it any more obvious?

He was a punk, she did ballet. What more can I say?

He wanted her, she'd never tell, secretly she wanted him as well.

But all of her friends, they stuck up their nose, and they had a problem with his baggy clothes.

Zayn turns so he's facing the boys again, but plays it off so it's not as obvious to the crowd that he's singing right to them.

He was a skater boy, she said "See you later, boy."

He wasn't good enough for her.

She had a pretty face, but her head was up in space.

She needed to come back down to earth.

Louis swallows the bile that's rising up his throat and swiftly turns around, refusing to allow Zayn the pleasure of watching him cry. He shoves past Liam and Niall and runs until he's in an unfamiliar grey hallway, falling to the ground, his body shaking with the force of his sobs. He cries like that for a little while and then quiets down, tucking himself into a small ball and leaning against the dirty walls, closing his eyes as Zayn's muted voice floats around him.

He was a skater boy, she said "See you later, boy."

He wasn't good enough for her.

Now he's a superstar, slammin' on his guitar.

Does your pretty face see what he's worth?

------------

Louis continues to sit against the wall, squeezing his eyes shut until he hears familiar voices float down the hall.

"You're a fucking dick."

"You're one to talk."

"I'm not the one pouring salt on open wounds, Zayn. What the hell did Lou do? He did not deserve that."

"He dumped Harry. Because of you."

"Are you an idiot? Harry dumped him." 

"What the hell are you talking about?" Zayn says, his voice slightly quieter, and he and Liam round the corner just then and see Louis huddled up. Liam is immediately at Louis' side, wrapping his arms around him and rubbing his back. 

Liam looks up at Zayn, a frown on his face. "It was Harry--" he begins, but Louis cuts him off.

"It was both of us." Louis says, quietly, and Zayn sighs, walking over to him and Liam and kneeling down. "I--I wanted him. I wanted us. Harry tried so hard, so hard to get me to admit that I loved him, which I did, but I just couldn't say it out loud because then everything would become real and I'd fuck everything up like I've always done and Liam and Niall would get hurt again because of me--"

"Wait, what?" Zayn interrupts, his eyes moving from Louis to Liam. "Hurt how?"

Liam sighs. "It's nothing, really, Zayn."

Louis shakes his head. "No. It's something. It's a lot." He looks at Zayn. "I've had a lot of crap relationships, did you know that?"

Zayn shrugs. "I mean, I heard stuff around school, but…"

"It was probably all true." Louis finishes. "Christ, I fucked everything up. I really did." 

Zayn sits down, crossing his legs, his eyes on Liam, who doesn't match his gaze. "How? If you don't mind me asking." He says, his tone curious.

Louis exhales deeply. "Well, after I lost my virginity to this guy named Greg, I kind of became…a slut?" Liam opened his mouth to protest but Louis waved it away. "It's true. There were a string of guys--just fucks for fun, y'know? Because I was young and fit and whatnot. I was always safe and everything, but nothing meant anything. None of them lasted. The shortest was two weeks, the longest…a few months."

Liam's mouth set into a hard line and Zayn frowned at that. "…and?" He asked, still watching Liam.

"His name was Nick. He was, like, 7 years older than us. It was ridiculous. I met him at some club and I couldn't get enough of him. I clung to him like a little kid, and he loved it, he loved having me on a leash like that." Louis closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall. "He fucked me up. Bad. Had me skipping school and lying to my mom and everything. Liam and Niall covered for me for everything, though."

Liam reached over and interlocked his fingers with Louis', and Louis bit his lip.

"He got me hooked on…on these pills. To this day, I still don't know what they were called, but he had bottles and bottles of them and he'd all but pour them into my mouth. I stopped eating and I couldn't go a couple hours without taking them. One night we--well, Li and Niall--tried to take them away from me, and I went mental."

Louis tightens his grip on Liam's hands, his voice wavering, and Liam slowly combs his other fingers through Louis' hair, petting him softly.

"I hit Niall." Louis says, swallowing back tears. "I hit Niall. Do you know how fucked up you have to be to hit Niall?"

Zayn doesn't say anything, just nods, but keeps looking at Liam, who's still holding Louis close.

"And I hurt him. Bad. Cut his lip, bloodied him up, broke his nose. His whole face was practically purple by the end of it. Liam--he tried to hold me back, but…"

"Lou knocked me out." Liam says quietly, and gives a small smirk. "I'd like to see him try that now."

"I still don't know how I managed it." Louis replies, letting out a small laugh.

"You were like a rabid dog. It was ridiculous." Liam says, his smile fading. "You did make it out with the drugs, though. I had to take Niall to the hospital myself, I couldn't let any of our moms see anything."

Louis nods solemnly, licking his lips. "I never knew what you told them. I always thought you ended up telling them what really happened."

Liam laughs darkly. "That would've been a spectacle. No, we told them it was bullies, and we were so tight-lipped about it that they could never find anyone to blame it on, so…"

Louis nods again, his breath catching as some tears finally fall from his eyes. "Yeah. Um…thanks for that."

"So did you stop?" Zayn asks, his voice hoarse, and both Louis and Liam jump a bit, as if they'd both forgotten he was there. "What happened then?"

Louis shakes his head. "It shouldn't have taken any more than my best friend's ruined face to knock some sense back into me, but Nick still existed, and I was probably as addicted to him as I was to those pills." He sighs. "There was this party."

Liam tenses up, wincing a bit, and suddenly Zayn is by his side, wrapping his long fingers over Liam and Louis' interlocked hands. Liam looks up at him, surprised, but doesn't pull away.

"It was at Nick's place. I practically lived there at the time. I was so high, it was--it was unbelievable. I remember everything, though, and that's the worst part of it all. I remember walking into Nick's bedroom to see him wrapped around some stupid model he'd known for all of two hours. He saw me and he just laughed at me and kept fucking the guy, so I went ballistic. I fucked up his bedroom--I'm pretty sure I broke everything in there. The mirrors, his clothes, whatever I could get my hands on. By the time Nick had realized what I was doing, I'd punched the huge glass mirror on his dresser and I was throwing shards at his face. I'm pretty sure I cut the model a fair bit, but then Nick got up and grabbed me and threw me on the bed and started hitting me, hard, and I just kicked back until I got him in the balls."

Louis gives a small smile of victory and Liam rolls his eyes.

"I grabbed the biggest bottle of pills I could see from his room and ran out while he was still cussing me out. I ended up on the roof, somehow, with a full fifth of vodka." Louis continues. "And I took the pills."

Zayn's jaw drops. "All of them?" He asks, looking from Louis to Liam and back. "With booze? Christ, Louis, how many?"

"Twenty-five? Thirty?" Louis shrugs, watching Zayn's eyebrows rise. "I lost count after ten."

"How are you still alive?" 

"Liam showed up."

Zayn turns his head to look at the other boy, his eyes suddenly full of adoration and guilt. "Yeah?" He asks, and Liam nods silently.

"Niall was in the hospital." Liam says. "And I wanted Louis to be there, to see what he'd done, so I went over to Nick's. I couldn't find Louis anywhere, but I found Nick, who started cussing me out then, throwing punches and kicks. He got a few of his friends to gang up on me, and…"

"Shit, Li." Zayn breathes, his grip on the boys' hands tightening. 

"They left after a while." Liam says, shrugging. "They really only broke my wrist."

"Only?" Louis asks, scoffing.

"I found Louis on the roof." Liam continues, ignoring him. "The bottle of pills was empty, and so was the vodka. He was standing on the ledge, looking down."

"I was going to jump." Louis says. "I had one more pill. I had no idea what I was doing. And then Liam grabbed me and pulled me down, screaming at me, and I don't remember anything he said, I just remember feeling so scared and heartbroken and--"

"I slapped you."

"Yeah, okay, I remember that."

"And then you started crying."

"And then the police showed up."

"Fuck." Zayn says. 

"We--" Louis says, glancing at Liam and rolling his eyes at his glare. "Okay, Liam convinced them that Nick had drugged me. Which, I guess, was kind of true. I was so sleepy but they wouldn't let me go to sleep because of all the shit I had in me."

"We went to the hospital to get Louis' stomach pumped. And my wrist set."

"And we were next to Niall's room. And do you know what that fucker did when he saw us?"

Zayn shakes his head and Louis does the same in reply.

"He smiled, Zayn." Louis continues, sighing and smiling. "The idiot laughed and hugged me and apologized!"

"Sorry about that." A voice chimes in, and all three boys look up to see Niall leaning against the wall, smirking, though his eyes are rimmed red, as if he's been crying. "I should've slapped the shit out of you."

"Liam already did that."

"So?"

Louis snorts, Liam giggles, and Niall smiles, and soon the three of them are laughing wildly, Zayn looking at all of them like they're crazy.

"You three are idiots." He mumbles, but smiles nonetheless. Liam shrugs, and Zayn takes a shaky breath. "And I'm sorry." He adds, looking right at Liam, though Niall nods in acceptance.

Liam sighs. "You had your reasons." He says, shrugging, but Zayn shakes his head.

"No. Fuck. I should've talked to you, I should've asked for your side of the story." He replies.

Someone clears their throat, and everyone looks up to see Harry staring at the four of them, his eyes wide. Louis sits up straight, tensing up, and Liam throws a protective arm around his shoulders.

"Hi." Harry says, and bites his lip worriedly. "I, uh, I don't know if I was supposed to hear all that--"

Louis opens his mouth to reply, but Harry keeps talking.

"--but I'm glad I did."

No one says anything, so Harry takes a shaky breath, and runs a hand through his hair.

"Fuck. I. I'm an idiot. Shit, I really am. I owe you all--every one of you--an apology, because I've been a crap human being." He says, rambling, playing with his hands nervously. "Zayn, I didn't lie to you, but I might as well have, because Louis did nothing, and I let you believe that he broke my heart, and that was so, so wrong of me. I just--I wanted someone on my side, because no one else was."

Zayn bites his lip but nods in reply, and Harry exhales and continues.

"Li, Niall, I--fuck, I love you guys so much." Harry says, which causes both boys mentioned to raise their eyebrows in surprise. "I've loved you guys since we landed in Cali, and some part of me wanted to hate you so much for keeping me and Louis apart, even though I guess now you really didn't, but I just couldn't, because we become best friends and you were so much fun to talk to be around and I still can't be mad at you two for anything, especially after hearing all that, fuck. Maybe…maybe it was good that Lou and I wasn't together?" Harry finishes quietly, and everyone's staring at him in shock.

"I was in some deep shit, guys. I really was." Harry states, and then looks up to Louis. "I…I know who you were talking about. Nick? Grimshaw?"

Louis just gapes at him, so Harry continues. 

"I also know the pills you were talking about. I, um, sold them. To kids at our school."

Liam, Niall, and Louis continue staring at him, shocked, but Zayn shakes his head, disappointed. "I knew it." He says, and Harry looks down at the ground, ashamed.

"Nick was my supplier. I met him accidentally but he got me into a bunch of crap and before I knew it, I was involved in his whole operation. I was in so deep but I was making so much money that I just didn't care. I only took the pills once, just to see what the big deal was, but then Nick started yelling at me about how dealers couldn't get hooked and how I'd lose my job if I kept that up. And then we got the chance to go to Cali." Harry pauses, shaking his curls out and combing them back. "And Nick lost it. He said that I belonged to him, which was total bullshit, and then he tried to kiss me, and I lost it."

Louis swallows, audibly, and Harry looks up at him, offering a small smile. "I guess you could say I pulled a Louis?"

It's silent for a moment but then Niall chuckles, and Harry looks at him gratefully. "Did Nick get the Niall treatment?" He asks, raising an eyebrow but smiling.

Harry nods, and then even Liam smirks a bit, though Louis just keeps staring at him. "Maybe even worse." Harry adds. "I was just so pissed at everything and I took it out on him. And then I felt like crap so I ran away and ended up somewhere I probably shouldn't have been."

"My house?" Louis speaks, his voice shaky, and Harry nods.

"Yeah." 

Harry hesitates for a second and then slowly walks over to Louis, kneeling down so that he's eye-level with the boy 

"I'm an asshole, Lou. A twat. An idiot. A stupid bastard. I shouldn't have left you like that. I shouldn't have left period. I should've called. It's been five years and every single day all I think about is you."

Louis bites his lips and blinks frantically as tears begin to gather in his eyes. Harry reaches up and grabs his face in both of his palms, and the memory is so warm and familiar that Louis can do nothing but close his eyes and gasp in surprise. 

Harry leans closer and touches their foreheads together.

"I never stopped watching out for you." He whispers. "Every time we came to New York I kept an eye out for you. I just wanted to see you, to remember that you were real and that you were a thing I could've had, could've loved, because I felt so sorry for myself. I…I came to your show."

"I know." Louis whispers back. "My mom told me. The night before you left for California, right?"

Harry chuckles. "No, Louis. Your show here."

Louis freezes. "What?"

"I watched you dance, Louis, and you were amazing. All I could think about was how much I loved you and how good you looked. You seemed so happy and I…I thought that you had found someone. I thought that I was intruding. So…I didn't say hello. And I'm sorry."

"Harry…I haven't performed in weeks."

"Okay. And?"

"The last show I was in was over a month ago, I--you were there?"

Harry blushes a bit, pulling back, and nods.

"Weren't you all on tour?"

"I found out what company you were in, and I saw that you were in a show. So I flew up for it."

"For me?"

Harry frowns. "Yeah, Lou, of course. I'd fly across the country every night if it meant I got to see you."

Louis swallows and pulls his hands out from Liam and Zayn, who've been holding on and listening intently to the conversation unfolding in front of them. He lifts his hands, shaking, and gently smooths out the lines in between Harry's eyebrows.

"You would?" He says, so quietly that it takes Harry a moment to figure out what he's said, and then Harry nods quickly.

"Louis, I love you."

Louis stops breathing and Harry leans closer until their noses are touching. "Say it again." Louis whispers, and Harry is quick to oblige.

"I love you." Harry breathes, and Louis inhales at the same time, his heart rate increasing. "I've loved you since the first time we made love, Louis, I loved you even when we said we couldn't be together and you left me. I loved you every time we all ate dinner together, and I brought another date just to see how jealous I could make you, because I wanted you to tear them off me and take their place. I loved you every time I kissed one of them, every time I tried to fall out of love with you. I loved you even after you slapped me, and I loved you more as I watched you dance for the first time. I loved you five years ago, when I showed up at your door before I'd have to leave. I loved you even when you told me no for the last time, when you said that you didn't want to be with me, you couldn't be with me. I wanted to hate you. I wanted to loathe you for not wanting me. But I loved you too much and I couldn't stop, Louis. I've never stopped."

Louis is crying now, sobbing, and his tears are flowing fast as he grips Harry's face. "Thank you." He says, and then presses their lips together, and the wind is knocked out of him. Harry leans into him, pressing him against the wall, and Louis wraps his arms around Harry's neck, breaking the kiss when he runs out of breath. 

"I'm sorry. I'm so, so, sorry. I wanted you every day, Harry, I should've said yes and I should've been with you. I'm not sorry you came to my house that night because I love you, Harry, and it was you telling me you loved me that made me realize it. I love you so much and I'm sorry and--"

Harry silences him with another kiss, this one a bit rougher, but Louis still melts into him, after all this time. He holds the kiss until Harry pulls away and pulls Louis into him, wrapping himself around him.

"Well." Niall says, and Louis turns to face him, Harry doing the same. "Since I hate feeling like the odd one out," he continues, and Louis glances over to see Liam's bruised lips and Zayn's ruffled hair and bites back a smile. "I'm gonna, uh, head back to the hotel. You are all…free to do what you wish. It's not like I control your actions or anything. I am your ex-manager, after all."

Louis giggles as Zayn rolls his eyes. "C'mon, Ni, you know I didn't mean it."

"Maybe I'll go manage The Wanted or something!" Niall shouts over his shoulder as he disappears down a hallway.

------------

Louis wakes up, rubbing his eyes, at mid-morning, feeling as light as a feather. He's warm all over, and it takes him a while to realize that it's because there's a significantly large man wrapped around him. He almost has a panic attack before he remembers who it is and why he's here as the memories from the night before come flooding back. 

He lifts up his covers curiously and sighs a bit disappointedly when he sees that both him and Harry have their underwear on.

Harry wakes up at the noise, grumbling about the time before he sees Louis. He pauses and then his lips curve into a slow smile.

"Morning." He drawls, his rough, low voice going straight to Louis' cock. "Sleep well?"

Louis nods and hesitates a bit before running a hand through Harry's hair. The boy pushes into the motion though, letting out a sigh of satisfaction as Louis gently scratches his scalp.

"I missed your curls." Louis says quietly. 

"Just my curls?" Harry teases, eyebrow raised.

Louis rolls his eyes and scootches closer to Harry till their bodies are pressed together, and he shivers at the contact. "Yeah, pretty much." He quips, and Harry scoffs, mock offended, and leans in to kiss Louis.

It's deep and slow, and Louis hasn't realized how much he's missed Harry's kisses, but he's practically dissolving into the other boy's touches, pressing their bodies close although they're already flush against each other.

"Last night, did we…?" Harry asks, and Louis shakes his head.

"I think we were both kind of worn out." He says, and Harry nods in agreement.

There's a small pause in the conversation, though it's not awkward at all, and Louis uses the moment to trace over the lines of the many new tattoos that Harry's branded himself with.

"Do, um," Harry begins. "Would you want to--"

Louis rolls his eyes and kisses Harry again, making sure to press his erection against Harry's thigh, hoping the other boy gets the message. Harry seems to, and moans in satisfaction as he turns them over so he's looming over Louis, grinding his hips down slowly.

"God, I've missed you." Harry mumbles into Louis' neck, gently nibbling at his jaw.

Louis hums in agreement, feeling warmth tingle through his body as his erection rubs against Harry's. He rubs his hands against Harry's back and then slides them under the waistband of his briefs, pushing them down. Harry lifts up his hips so that he can push them off and then practically rips off Louis' as well.

"Eager, are we?" Louis asks, cocking an eyebrow.

"Shut up." Harry says. "It's been too long."

"I bet I have you beat."

"I'll take that bet." Harry said, smirking. "I haven't even kissed someone since I went to your show."

Louis frowns a little, the thought of Harry kissing--let alone sleeping with--someone else twisting his stomach with jealousy. He knows he should be expecting Harry to sleep around a bit, considering his celebrity status, but it still irritates him, especially considering his own unplanned celibacy. He manages to paste a smile onto his face.

"You're practically a saint." He says, chuckling.

"I do live quite the rock-and-roll lifestyle…" Harry quips, but his smile falls as he watches Louis' expression grow solemn for a moment. "Shit. Sorry. We shouldn't be talking about this."

Louis shrugs. "I feel like what we need is more talking, to be honest."

"All right. Fine." Harry says. "Tell me your body count."

"What?" Louis asks, puzzled.

"Your tally sheet!" Harry replies. "Your little black book?" He tries, but to no avail, as Louis just cocks his head in confusion. Harry sighs. "How many people you've slept with, Louis. Since…well, since us."

"Oh." Louis says, and tenses up for a moment. Harry can sense it, though, and he gently rubs a thumb over Louis' cheekbone.

"Hey," he begins, softly. "I don't care, Lou, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

Louis turns into Harry's touch, so much so that his face is buried in his pillow. His cheeks are growing warm with embarrassment, because he hasn't even tried to get laid in the past five fucking years, and that's beyond pathetic. He can practically imagine his teenage self staring in disbelief at what he's become.

"Okay." He sighs, his voice muted by the pillow. "…none."

Harry chuckles, turning Louis to face him. "Repeat that, sorry, for a second I thought you said--"

"None." Louis finishes, repeating himself. He bites his lip. "I haven't slept with anyone. I haven't done anything with anyone." He watches Harry's eyes go wide with shock. "Okay, fine, maybe a few kisses here and there, but I was drunk?" He offers.

"Louis." Harry says, like his name is a prayer, and he's biting his lip. "You haven't had sex in five years?" He finishes, his voice tinged with disbelief and guilt.

Louis shakes his head. "I could never bring myself to, y'know? It just…hurt. And not, like, physically, but emotionally. At first I thought it was, like, the type of guy, so I went to a bunch of punk bars and whatnot but…nobody was you, I guess."

"God." Harry replies, rubbing his face with his hands. "I feel like such a dick. I am a dick. I can't believe I was telling you all this and you…you haven't done anything."

"Don't worry about it, Harry, please." Louis says. "I swear it'll be just as good. I promise. It's like riding a bike, yeah?"

Harry turns to look at him, letting out a small laugh of disbelief. Louis feels a pang of hurt but then Harry's pulling him close, giving him little kisses as he whispers in his ear.

"You're worried," Harry starts, "that the sex won't be good?"

Louis nods hesitantly, and Harry laughs again, nuzzling his hair. "God, where did I go right? Where did you come from, Louis?"

"Harry," Louis mumbles, embarrassed again. "I'm so confused."

Harry chuckles and kisses his forehead, pulling away so he can look Louis in the eyes. Louis sees Harry's eyes brimming with tears but a smile spread wide across his face.

"Five years ago, when I came to your house, and we…y'know." Harry says, and Louis nods slowly. "You told me it'd been a while. You didn't sleep with anyone the entire time we hadn't been together.

"Oh. Yeah." Louis says, as the memory sweeps over him. 

"And you did it again." Harry says, biting his lip. "Fuck, Louis, you did it again. For me?"

Louis nods, his brow furrowed. "Of course. Why would I even want anyone else?"

"I thought you didn't want me."

"I've always wanted you, Harry. I'm pretty sure I wanted you before I even knew you existed."

"I can't believe I was, like, bragging to you about what I'd been doing, Lou, I'm so sorry. I thought you were getting all kinds of action, y'know?"

Louis snorts. "Please."

"Lou, have you seen your ass in a leotard?"

"I try to avoid most mirrors when I'm in spandex." Louis says, and then laughs because Harry's smiling like an idiot and shaking his head in disbelief and he's here and in Louis' bed and everything's beautiful.

Harry leans over and captures Louis in a soft kiss, which slowly gets rougher as he pushes Louis into his mattress. Louis moans deeply but lets himself be smothered by Harry, the warm weight of his body so undeniably familiar. Harry moves down to nibble at his neck and ghosts his lips over Louis' collarbones.

"I'm never sleeping with anyone else ever again." He says, his voice barely above a whisper, but Louis hears it and freezes. Harry pauses, biting his lip, and Louis remembers how to breathe.

"Yeah?" He asks, his hand finding its way into Harry's hair again, and Harry lets out a sigh of relief--though Louis isn't sure exactly towards what--as he nods.

"Yeah." Harry answers, and then his lips are on Louis' again, pressing down, warm and comfortable, and Louis feels the arousal slowly pump through him. It's not like what it always used to be, fast and rushed and fueled by the prospect of sex. Instead it's patient, working its way around his body, urged on by what he's feeling for the boy above him, which is pure, unquestionable love.

Harry can apparently feel Louis' growing boner and grunts in approval, arranging himself so that his own hard-on is pressed against Louis'. They moan simultaneously and then break out in giggles, because neither of them even care about being sexy by this point, and the whole idea of even trying to do so seems incredibly ridiculous and unnecessary. 

"I love you." Harry says, like it's a casual thing now, and it almost is.

Louis sighs contently in reply and reaches over to his bedside drawer, pulling out a bottle of lube.

"Um," he begins, and Harry gives him a questioning look. "You're good, right?"

Harry looks over at the lube and smiles, understanding. "Yeah." He nods, reaching over to pluck the container out of Louis' grip. He's quicker than Louis remembers and it's just a few seconds later that Louis feels Harry's finger at his hole, circling around.

A shiver runs through his entire body as he tries to get his heart rate to slow down.

Harry seems to understand, biting his lip. "I'll go slow." He promises, and gently pushes his finger in.

It's been ages since he's had someone else's fingers in him, but Louis adjusts quickly enough, grinding himself down eagerly in a few minutes. Harry adds another slick finger, and Louis looks up to see Harry watching him with amazement, his lips red and eyes dark with arousal.

"The last time we did this," Harry says, twisting his fingers so that Louis lets out a shuddering gasp, "the lights were off."

"The lights were off every time we've done this." Louis corrects him, moaning in between his words as he adjusts himself to Harry.

"What a pity."

Harry adds a third finger then, a bit unexpectedly, but Louis takes it eagerly, and soon he's writhing in the sheets, one hand gripping his bedspread and the other pulling at Harry's hair.

"Harry," he breathes out, desperate. "Please."

Harry exhales, his breath hitching, and Louis reaches down to find the boy fully erect, the tip of his cock already wet with pre-come. Louis rubs his fingers along the barbell, which is still cool to the touch, surprisingly.

"I almost forgot about this." Louis admits, stroking the piece of metal, his fingers gently grazing the head of Harry's dick.

Harry moans, pulling his fingers out, and Louis gasps at the feel of being so open, so exposed to everything. 

"You'll remember soon enough." Harry quips, smirking, and then he presses his entire length into Louis in one go.

Louis' whole body feels like it's on fire, but in the best way possible. He lifts his legs and hooks them together over Harry's back, pushing him in even deeper. 

"What happened to going slow?" He says, gasping for breath as both he and Harry grind against each other.

"Oops." Harry quips, but not too convincingly, and his expression just makes Louis roll his eyes.

"You're an idiot."

"Good thing I'm so hot." Harry says roughly, pulling out a bit and thrusting back into Louis, who's too preoccupied with trying to breathe properly to reply. "And rich. And famous. And talented." He continues, pulling out and pushing back in with every sentence.

Louis bites his lip, arching his back a bit so Harry rubs against his prostate. "Fuck," he breathes. "Can you list your qualifications a bit faster?"

Harry just grunts in reply and fucks Louis harder, quickening his pace. Both of them are too focused on the feel of what they're doing to even attempt to make conversation, and Louis is glad because he loves how Harry looks when he's concentrating on him, biting his lip with his gaze focused on Louis' face.

Louis' painfully hard by now, and he glances down to see himself flush against his own stomach. He groans and reaches down, rubbing his hand over his length, and Harry bats him away to grasp Louis' cock in his hand. Harry's hands are just so unbelievably big and it doesn't take much for him to cover almost all of Louis' cock with his grip, the warmth and pressure of his touch inching Louis closer and closer towards his orgasm.

His toes curl as he feels himself getting close, and all he manages to say is Harry's name before he's coming so hard that he sees spots. He doesn't remember having an orgasm this intense in, well, ever, and he's still coming down from it when he hears Harry curse and pull out of him, spilling himself onto Louis' stomach.

Harry and Louis are both silent, the only sounds in the room coming from their open mouths as they both try to catch their breath. 

Harry's on top of Louis before Louis knows what's happening, and he's kissing him with fervor, his tongue pressing into every part of Louis' mouth. They lay there kissing for while until Louis pulls away and makes a face.

"We're gross." He announces, and Harry laughs, loud and deep, which makes Louis' stomach twist with nostalgia and happiness.

"How's about we clean ourselves off, then?" Harry suggests, rolling himself off the bed and pulling Louis up with him. Louis hums happily and wraps himself around Harry, letting the taller boy half-carry, half-walk him to the bathroom.

Louis makes sure the water's just this side of scalding before he jumps in, shuddering a bit as the hot water hits his body. Harry steps in right after him, pulling him into a hug.

"Thanks." Louis says, without really thinking.

"Okay. You're welcome." Harry replies. "For what, exactly?"

Louis pauses, biting his lip. "…everything?"

"Thank you."

"Why?"

"I love you." Harry says, nuzzling his cheek.

"That doesn't even make any sense!" Louis protests, but smiles nonetheless.

"So?" Harry huffs, pouting. "You haven't even said it back."

Louis grins, reaching up to press Harry's damp hair back as he stands up on his toes to press a small kiss to Harry's nose, then his lips. "I love you." He says, pulling Harry down for another kiss, this one deeper and slower. "I love you."

------------

"So?" Niall asks, his eyes darting from Louis to Harry.

The two boys in question just give each other a knowing look and then burst into laughter, falling into each other.

"I guess that answers the question." Zayn says, rolling his eyes. "Keep it in your pants, at least, all right guys?"

"You are a fucking hypocrite, Malik." Niall retorts. "Don't think I haven't been noticing how often you and Li have been sneaking off to do god-knows-what in an alley behind god-knows-where. It's disgusting."

"I think it's hot." Liam blurts, and then turns pink once he realizes what he's said.

Louis and Harry are now practically roaring with laughter and Liam buries his face into Zayn's shirt.

"Make them stop!" He whines, and Zayn just shushes him, petting his hair. 

"It's okay, Li." Zayn says, smirking. "I think it's pretty hot too."

Niall makes a gagging noise and turns back to Louis and Harry. "Seriously, though, guys. You're good?" He asks, and Louis smiles at the genuine concern in his best friend's eyes. He turns to look at Harry and smiles even wider.

"Yeah." Louis says, and Harry smiles back.

"Really good." Harry confirms.

"So good." Louis adds.

"Super good."

"The most good."

"The goodest."

"That's not even a word, Harold."

"That's not even my name, Lewis." 

Louis scoffs and shoves Harry playfully, squealing when the taller boy roars and wraps his long arms around him. 

"Niall, help! Niall!" He cries, trying to reach out to the boy.

Niall just rolls his eyes waves them off, focusing his attention on trying to break up Zayn and Liam's impromptu makeout session with his foot.

Eventually Louis stops struggling and just lays there, tucked into Harry's torso, and Harry starts nuzzling his hair and kisses his cheek. Louis looks around and watches Liam laugh with Niall at some weird joke, sees how Zayn smiles at the two of them with so much love in his eyes. 

Liam notices Louis looking and offers a smile of his own, giving him a small nod that Louis returns. Harry chuckles, so he's obviously seen the little exchange between them, and Louis relaxes a bit more, sinking into Harry's grip.

It's all pretty much perfect.

------------