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He's given a choice. Louis tells him to think about it and Nick does. He thinks because there's a fucking lot to think about and Nick needs a minute.
The sun is bright as he leaves the house, brighter than it has any right to be. He squints up at it, muttering curses under his breath, before he notices Zayn sitting on the porch step, smoking. He appears to be deep in thought and, well, yeah. Nick gets that.
Rubbing his face, he sits down next to Zayn and pulls out a cigarette of his own and he's not sure what to say so he settles on silence. He's good at silence, despite what people say, better at it than compassion, anyway. So, they smoke in silence and Zayn has this pinched thoughtful expression as he stares blankly ahead, like he's trying to figure something and Nick just closes his eyes against the brightness in the air.
And somehow Nick ends up in a pub with Zayn Malik at two in the afternoon, getting pissed off of 2 pound pints.
He barely even realises it happening, just lets Zayn silently tug him away from the porch, away from the house, and then he's at a darkened pub, sitting at a tall table with a beer between his fingers. They hold the silence, drinking and thinking their way through two pints, and Nick's mind is getting clouded with thoughts he never wanted to think. Never thought he'd have to, really.
“He told me to think about whether or not I want to stay,” Nick finally blurts out, halfway through his third pint.
“Yeah? What'd you say?” Zayn takes a sip from his glass, eyes trained on Nick's.
“Said I'd think about it,” Nick shrugs, staring into his own beer. “There's a lot to think about.”
Zayn nods but doesn't respond, letting another prolonged silence fall over the table. Nick gets lost in the pale liquid in his glass, drawing patterns in the condensation and watching it drip down the side.
“Shouldn't you be, like, threatening me? Isn't that what you best friend types do? 'If you don't stay, I'll tear your balls off' or something like?” Nick finally looks up to see a calculating look in Zayn's eyes.
Zayn stares for a moment, the look in his eyes growing sad, before he finally quirks the corner of his lips up.
“I don't need to threaten you, Grimmy. You're not going anywhere and you know it.”
Nick hesitates, gripping his glass tightly as he thinks it over before slumping down in his chair and leaning forward to drop his head in his hands. Zayn's right, of course. He couldn't not stay. It's Louis.
“I'm really not looking forward to the day this sinks in,” Nick mumbles.
“I hear ya, mate,” Zayn agrees.
After another pint, he calls Louis and gets his voicemail. He leaves a long drunken message explaining that he's not leaving, couldn't leave, and that he'll be there tomorrow and the day after that and so on until there are no more days and Nick will have been with him forever.
-
For a while it feels a bit like there should be a waiting list to get in to see Louis. His mum has come to stay indefinitely, Harry's there every day, and Louis has too many sodding friends. So, for a while, Nick doesn't see him a lot, just a few times a week, just for an hour or so before he's kicked out by Louis' mum delivering pain meds or one of the many people in Louis' life who have fallen madly in love with him coming just to be in his presence for a little bit.
But when they can finally be alone, door locked, it's so different because everything slows down and it's just them and they can take their time.
Nick fucks Louis slowly, even though Louis insists he can take it rougher. He pushes in, memorising the feeling, each drag of warm skin across his cock, each quiver of muscle around him. The tiny beads of sweat at Louis' hairline. The flutter of his eyelids as Nick bottoms out. The way he whispers Nick's name, his voice small and coated with more than lust, more than need.
He memorises it all, keeps it like a tattoo, like ink buried under his skin.
-
It sinks in on a Tuesday afternoon, when he's at lunch with Louis and his bandmates. Nick has gotten used to the constant physical contact between the five boys since he's been around them. He barely even notices it anymore, but today is different. The hugs are longer and they keep touching Louis like if they touch him enough, maybe they can keep him.
At one point, Liam actually stands from his chair across the table and moves to bend behind Louis' chair, hugging around his shoulders, burying his face in his neck. He stays there for five minutes, just holding him and when Nick meets Louis' eyes, Louis frowns back like they're sharing a silent “poor lad” and Nick could almost laugh because Louis feels bad for Liam. Louis.
But then, of course he does.
One thing Nick has learned about his boyfriend in their time together is that he doesn't think about himself near as much as he thinks about his friends, his family. Even now, he's more concerned with how everyone else is handling it.
It's something that took Nick by surprise early on, how selfless Louis is. On the surface, he's all biting words and loud jokes, but then Nick got to see the under part, the core part. The part that's fiercely protective of those around him, the part that doesn't love halfway.
Nick quietly excuses himself to the restroom and stands in front of the mirror there, staring into his reflection. He stares for a long time, thinking it through. He stares and his heartbeat drums in his ears because this is really happening. He doesn't know how or why, fucking why this is happening, but it's happening and Nick can't quite breathe. Slumping back against the tiled wall, he focuses on working his lungs, trying to steady his muscles which all seem to have gone shaky.
“Fuck.”
He doesn't go back out until ten minutes have passed and he can finally stand on his own and he's got a fake smile painted on his face.
-
“Hey,” Nick says kindly, pulling Louis' pants back up.
Louis is staring past Nick's shoulder, cheeks tinted pink with embarrassment and probably anger and frustration, too. Nick shifts, trying to get Louis to look at him, but he just rolls his eyes and looks down.
“You're tired, love. It's not a big deal.”
Nick drops next to him, bringing his chin to rest on Louis' shoulder. He waits, watching as Louis stares blankly at his legs for a long while.
“Look at me, Lou, come on,” Nick says quietly. Still nothing. “We can try again tomorrow, yeah?”
Louis shakes his head just a bit and Nick follows the movement with his eyes.
“I'm always bloody tired,” Louis whispers, eyes still distant.
They never do try again. Nick doesn't calculate how much he's already lost.
-
“You know how some people do that stupid thing where they write a letter?” Louis asks.
Nick studies the dark purplish colour around his eyes, quirking his head to the side in a question as Louis continues, face turned down.
“Like, they don't say things to the person when they have the chance, but they write it out in a letter to leave when they're gone. Seems so stupid to me, you know?” Louis takes a deep audible breath, watching his thumbnail scratch at the material covering his thigh. “I'm not going to do that. I'm going to say things while I still have breath in my lungs. I'm not going to let a corpse tell you what you mean to me.”
Louis' eyes lift to meet his and Nick smiles softly, covering Louis' increasingly bony hand with his own. He thinks he has the bones memorised by now, knows them by heart.
“Good,” Nick says, leaning down to kiss the flesh stretched over those bones, pressing his lips lightly against the knuckles.
Louis sighs, leaning over to the bedside table and picking up a folded piece of paper before righting himself, looking to Nick again.
“But then I put myself in your position, tried to imagine what it'll be like for you. And I thought you might want something. Something you can hold onto?”
Nick bites his lip, ignores the way it wobbles under his sharp teeth, and traces the bones in Louis' hand with his thumb.
“So, I want you to take this and look at it after. Just as a reminder.”
He hesitates before passing the piece of paper over and Nick takes it carefully, terrified of something as simple as a piece of paper and some ink. Wood and dye. He tries to hide the slight tremble of his hands as he looks down at the folded up paper in his hands.
“Read it now and then let me tell you about the moment I fell in love with you because I never did tell you and it's such a good memory. It shouldn't die with me.”
Nick swallows thickly, lifting his gaze to meet Louis'. He stares for a long moment, studies the blue of his eyes and the purplish skin around them even though he's already got that memorised, too. Louis just smiles this tired, patient smile until Nick feels a hot tear falling down his own cheek and he looks to the side, quickly wiping the trail away.
It's the first tear he's cried since he found out. He wishes he could believe it will be the last.
Taking a deep breath, he shakily unfolds the paper and sees Louis' awful handwriting scrawled across the page in black biro.
The way I love you... it's not the kind of love that death can touch.
I love you now, as I write this. And I love you now, as you read this.
I may be temporary, but love isn't. Not this kind.
When Nick finishes, he's shaking harder, trying desperately to keep the tears back because he doesn't want to burden Louis with them. It doesn't seem fair. He's been burdened with enough.
“I love you,” Louis says softly as Nick folds the paper again, trying not to think about the next time he'll open it up and read over those words.
Nick nods, biting his lip again and trying to focus on breathing instead of the heat behind his eyes.
“Now let me tell you about the first time I realised it, yeah?”
Nick nods again, taking another deep breath before dragging his burning eyes up to Louis' cool blue ones. And as Louis tells him, Nick listens. He'll tell his own story another day. Today, he listens, takes anything Louis will give him, and he locks it all up inside of him. He knows he'll keep it forever.
-
"At least I'll never get old," Louis says, eyes twinkling. "Never wanted to get old."
Nick smiles because Louis wants light and casual. He doesn't want Nick to think too long about the reality of the situation.
"Shall I start singing?" Nick asks, leaning in close to the bed from where he's been lounging in the chair he pulled over from the corner of the room. He sings in a whisper, cheeky smile on his face. "Forever young, I wanna be-"
"Oh god, if you keep that up, I honestly hope the end is near," Louis interrupts sarcastically.
"See? Finding so many perks to this whole thing. Not getting old and wrinkly and gross, no more hearing me sing."
Once he's said it, they both sort of freeze and it's not really noticeable but it is, too. Nick anxiously flicks his eyes up to Louis' and he finds them wide and shining with realisation.
"No more hearing you sing," Louis agrees, nodding.
"Lou-" Nick starts, gently.
"No, no, it's fine," Louis says, a tear racing down his cheek. "You have an awful singing voice. I hate it when you sing."
Louis' crying softly, shaking his head, and Nick leaps forward, crawling onto the bed, pulling the boy's thin body into his chest.
"It's good," Louis repeats to himself, his voice hitching around his tears.
Nick can't breathe again, but it doesn't matter. He gets as close to his boyfriend as he possibly can, pressing his leg into Louis'. He wants him to feel that he's there; he's there and he's not leaving. He's there and he's losing the battle, but he's fighting for Louis anyway.
-
At work, everyone is quieter around him. Nick likes it, honestly, likes that he's getting silence more than overbearingly kind condolences and concerned hugs. He does get glances, though. He gets them all day, when his coworkers think they're being sneaky, checking on him out of the corner of their eyes. It's fairly constant and Nick has grown used to it by now.
But he'll let them have their glances without any complaint from Nick because they've been good to him. They screen the calls and tweets fiercely to make sure that Louis isn't mentioned. They don't take the piss when Nick drops a cue or blanks during his intros. They help him, guide him along when he needs it, and he's not a touchy feely guy, but it means something to him, the way they protect him. So they can have their glances. They can outright bloody stare for all Nick cares.
After a Wednesday show, Nick invites the crew out for drinks, his treat, and they gape at him silently for a minute.
“'S just drinks?” Nick offers, confused by the reaction he's getting.
“No, it's just you usually don't go out these days,” LMC says, head tilted, kindness seeping through her words.
“And your treat,” Matt interjects, stunned.
Nick throws a pencil at his face, then shrugs.
“Just thought it'd be good,” Nick says, pushing his chair in behind him and standing there awkwardly.
And, the thing is, Nick doesn't do awkward. He does awkward in the I've just made a complete tit of myself way but he doesn't do this. Then again, there are a lot of things he never used to do.
When they go, Aimee meets them there and Nick hadn't realised how long it's been since he's seen her until she's in front of him. He feels a little guilty, but a little angry, too. He's always a little angry, though. Bitter.
After a few rounds, Aimee slides up next to Nick in the booth and settles into his side in a way that's not overbearing, but just a nice, warm weight to lean against.
“You hanging in?” she asks quietly, arm wrapped around his shoulder.
Nick just nods because that's what you do and then he tips back his bottle of Stella, already feeling his skin buzz with tingling numbness as the alcohol settles in.
“I could bake things. If you wanted. Or if he wanted,” Aimee offers.
Nick can feel Matt's gaze on him from where he's sitting directly across from him and he flicks his own eyes up to meet it. Matt's look is calculating and genuine and kind in a way Nick doesn't ever remember seeing him.
But there's more to the look, something that takes Nick a long moment to discern. It's fear, he finally realises. Somewhere behind his eyes, Matt looks quietly afraid and Nick allows himself to share an honest silent moment with him, just looking back and letting him see the fear in his own eyes, too.
And maybe it's the alcohol, but he lets one word slip out, the first sincere thing he's really uttered to them since this all started.
“Sucks.”
He feels Aimee's grip around his shoulders tighten for a moment and he sees Matt nod slowly.
“Fucking sucks,” Matt agrees, lifting his beer to his lips.
And that's it, really. It just fucking sucks.
-
When Nick shows up at Louis' after work one day, Louis' mum greets him at the door with a hug and waves him upstairs, smiling. Once in the bedroom, he sees that Louis is alert, his eyes lighting up as Nick walks in.
“Thank god,” Louis sighs, clicking off the telly. “I'm so bored. Entertain me!”
Nick chuckles and bends down, dropping his lips against Louis' in a soft, smiling kiss before he crawls into the bed, lying on his side next to the boy. His hand falls to Louis' chest, resting there as he kisses Louis' clothed shoulder, then his lips again.
“Entertain you, hm?” Nick asks, sweeping Louis' hair back away from the blue of his eyes. “Well, I do have a story for you, but that's for later.”
“Oh?” Louis asks, eyebrows lifting to show more of the purple skin around his eyes. “Why later?”
“Waiting for the sunset. It's not a daylight kind of story.”
Louis eyes him quizzically, his skin crinkling up like he doesn't quite understand, but he's not asking questions. Nick kisses his wrinkled nose, feeling like he has to be entirely made of Louis by now. There's no room in him for anything else anymore, he's sure of it.
“Until then, I can tell you about work?”
Nick drops his head on the pillow next to Louis and Louis huffs, shrugging.
“My life is officially boring enough that I want to hear about your sodding day at work more than anything. This is a disaster.”
Nick laughs dryly, leaning in to kiss his boyfriend's lips again, feeling the dryness of them under his own. He brings a hand up to Louis' neck, the skin there soft and warm, and he sinks into the feeling.
“You're a bit of a drama queen, pet,” he says fondly, kissing a smile into his lips once more before pulling back and getting lost in the blue again.
It's every time, Nick realises. Every time Louis' eyelids lift and reveal that shining blue, it takes Nick's breath away, makes him feel lightheaded under the gaze. It's spectacular, really.
And as Nick goes over the relatively mundane details of his day, he swims in the ocean blue, stays inside that colour as he locks his eyes with Louis, speaking into it. And when Louis laughs, the blue sparkling up at him, Nick feels like he's just climbed Mount fucking Everest. That's how accomplished it makes him feel.
When the sun starts to set, the room is coated in dusky pink and it makes Louis look so young, the pink settling over his cheeks and colouring them like a blush. Nick absently strokes a thumb over the skin there, memorising this, too.
“It's sunset,” Louis says, blue trained onto Nick's brown. “Can I have my story?”
Nick smiles softly, too busy memorising to reply right away. The soft, warm skin under his thumb. The gentle movement of Louis' chest as he breathes. He picks at the details, then picks at the details of the details, studying each little thing and tucking it away in his mind.
“Okay,” he whispers, fingers drifting down across Louis' jaw, keeping each touch, each inch of skin. “Can we go outside? Watch the sun disappear?”
Louis smiles, blue like slivers between his eyelids.
“Are you a sap now, Mr. Grimshaw?” Louis asks, searching Nick's face like he knows every curve, but he has to make sure they haven't gone and changed on him.
“Maybe,” Nick replies, kissing Louis' cheek. “Maybe a bit.”
Louis hums happily and Nick memorises the sound, snatches it out of the air and holds it close to his chest.
“Okay, let's go,” Louis whispers across the pink-tinted air.
Nick tries to talk Louis into letting Nick carry him, but he's stubborn, insisting he can walk just fine; he's not a bloody paraplegic. So Nick fits under his arm, supporting as much weight as Louis will allow him to as they make their way downstairs one stair at a time. When he catches Louis cringing, he kicks himself for suggesting this, but it's just a moment before Louis' face is set again.
Once they're outside, Nick realises it was worth it because the air is warm and smeared with the colours of the sunset and Louis looks around like he hasn't seen anything this beautiful in ages. It makes Nick's chest tight with emotion and he thinks that's a bad sign for this little story he's about to tell if he's already starting with that.
They settle into big, wooden chairs in the garden after Nick runs inside to grab a blanket and he throws it over them, turning in his chair to face Louis. He seeks out Louis' hand under the blanket, his own fingertips fitting between the bones of the boy's knuckles.
“Comfortable?”
Louis hums again, the colours painting the sky turning more orange, making Louis look even warmer than usual. Nick traces the bones again, memorises them again, gets lost in the blue again. He's not sure he's breathing, actually.
“Give me my story,” Louis urges, his voice quiet and fond.
He's happy in this moment, Nick can tell, and he hopes he's not about to ruin it. Taking a deep breath, he looks toward the sunset, tracing the hazy clouds streaking across the sky with his eyes.
“It was a Sunday morning,” Nick states quietly, his fingers wrapping around Louis'. “I woke up early and the sun was still low. You'd stayed over and you were sprawled out next to me on the bed.”
Nick smiles to himself at the memory, remembering the way Louis' mouth was parted slightly, lips moving with each breath. Next to him, Louis listens curiously, not understanding what Nick's saying, but listening until he does.
“I watched you sleep as the sun came up and you were fucking golden, you know? I remember thinking then that I'd probably never get enough of looking at you.”
Nick slides his eyes over to Louis' and, no, he hasn't gotten enough of it. He really hasn't. Louis' smiling now, a confused smile, like he's been given a compliment without a reason and Nick continues on, wants him to understand.
“You woke up a little later and, when you saw me looking at you, you blushed and covered your face, throwing a pillow at my head, remember? And I just thought about that contrast you have. The soft and the hard, the warm and the cool. I realised that I couldn't pick a favorite because you wouldn't be you without both.”
Nick can tell that Louis still doesn't understand what this has to do with anything. He scoots as close as possible, lifting his free hand to Louis' jaw for a moment, smiling to himself, before dropping it again.
“That's when I fell in love with you. That's when I realised it.”
Louis' expression shifts slowly, realisation spreading across his features, blue sparking with the imminence of a smile.
“I changed then, you know?” Nick says, and suddenly his chest is tight again.
He swallows over the swelling in his throat, shaking his head at himself. Taking a deep breath, he rests his hand on Louis' forearm, hoping to steady himself enough to say the rest.
“I never thought I'd be the type to love like that,” he says tightly, trying to hold his emotions back, but they pour out around his words, they make themselves known anyway. “You may have noticed that I used to be quite the self-indulgent little prick. Still am sometimes, but now there's this thing in my life that's more important than me. And that's you. That's us.”
His chin is trembling and he makes every attempt to stop it, but it's useless. His fingers shake lightly against Louis' hand.
“It makes me better, Lou, it makes me so much better. I'm a better person since I fell in love with you and I just have to say thank you.” His voice cracks over that last bit and he grips tightly onto Louis' hand, losing the battle with his emotions. “I'm so thankful, Louis, that you made me love you and that you actually loved me back.”
Louis frowns, almost sympathetically, as Nick wipes a tear away from his cheek with shaky fingers.
“Since that Sunday morning all that time ago, my life has had a real purpose and you're that purpose and I need you to know, to understand, how happy I am that you came into my life like a bloody tornado and tore down all of my sodding walls and saw right through my bullshit. I'll never say thank you enough for that, never.”
The sound of crickets and Nick's stuttered breath fills the silence as Louis grips onto Nick's hand, dropping his gaze. Nick wipes his cheeks again, wondering if he has more to say because now seems to be the time to say things, all the things, now as the sun sets around them. But Louis' soft voice interrupts his thoughts before he can think of anything.
“I'm sorry,” he whispers. “I'm sorry I'm taking that away from you.”
Nick only pauses for a moment before he's pushing the blanket off himself, taking his hand away and moving over to Louis' chair. He fits his knees in the gaps between Louis' thighs and the armrests, carefully kneeling over his boyfriend, staring hard.
“You are not taking anything away from me,” Nick insists as he pushes his hands up Louis' shoulders, over the slope of his neck. “The kind of love death can't touch, yeah?”
Louis' hands lift to rest on Nick's thighs, his eyes shining up at Nick with a mixture of fear and sadness and happiness. Nick thinks it's so interesting how that works, how three conflicting emotions can be so evident in Louis' eyes, the blue spelling it out. He leans down to press a kiss into Louis' lips, another memory he tucks away for safe keeping.
“I'll still love you after and I'll still be a better person for it,” he whispers against Louis' lips before pressing into them again.
Louis' fingers dig into Nick's thighs as their lips move slowly together, the comfort of the kiss calming them. When Nick leans back, everything is blue and he speaks again, softly, letting his voice blend in with the crickets' chirping.
“I'll still love you,” he repeats because he wants to make sure Louis understands that, wants to make sure he understands that he means it.
-
They go for a drive one sunny Saturday. Jay's gone back to Doncaster for the weekend and Louis pleads with Nick, says he needs to get out of the house for a while. Nick gladly agrees and Harry frowns, but he nods and says “of course, yeah” when Nick tells him the plan.
Nick drives until the city disappears, until the road is lined with trees instead of buildings. Louis is smiling peacefully into the sun next to him, the rays hitting his skin and sinking in, making him light up with it.
He finds a nice deserted spot and pulls over at the top of a softly sloping hill, rolling countryside laid out before them. He grabs blankets and the picnic basket Harry had packed earlier from the back seat before he helps Louis out of the passenger side, one arm around Louis and one full of the other things. They walk away from the road, finding a flat spot in the sun to set up on.
An hour later, they've eaten a few grapes and biscuits and Nick has moved behind Louis, framing his body between his own legs, letting Louis lean back against his chest.
“You good?” Nick asks as they settle.
“Yeah,” Louis replies with a contented sigh.
His breath is heavy even though they're just sitting there, like he has to work at it, to keep breathing. Silence settles over them as Nick watches birds scatter across the sky and he lets the sun creep under his skin. It's comfortable. Nice. Distant rustling leaves and singing birds floating on the soft wind are the only sounds and it's peaceful, being here, away from everything.
“Do you think we would have gotten married?” Louis asks, like he's in a daze, watching the trees sway in the distance.
“Hmm,” Nick hums thoughtfully, dropping his chin onto Louis' shoulder. “Maybe. Someday.” He waits a beat before kissing Louis' neck lightly and asking, “Why do you ask?”
Louis shrugs, leaning his head back against Nick's shoulder, eyes closing. “Been thinking. Wondered if you ever thought about it.”
Nick brings his knees up, locking Louis in. A grasshopper hops onto the corner of their blanket before disappearing into the green grass again. He swallows.
“Do you want to get married?”
Louis' head moves slowly from side to side on Nick's shoulder. “No, just wondered if we would have, what would have changed.”
Nick has thought about. He's idly wondered what their future would have been like and he thinks it's possible that it would have happened. Marriage. Maybe even kids or at least a dog and some houseplants. Who knows. But he's never thought about how they'd get from here to there, what would have changed.
“I don't know,” Nick answers. “People just change over time. When I met you, the word marriage would have sent me running as far away as possible, but now I'm fine with it. People just change.”
Louis seems to accept that answer, falling silent again. The afternoon stretches on and Louis drifts off against Nick, letting the warmth of the sun lull him to sleep. Nick holds the sleeping boy close to his chest, listening to the steady breath, memorising the way it blends with the wind into one sound.
When he gets a cramp in his leg, he doesn't move. He lets the pain throb through his muscle because that he can do. He can endure pain to make sure Louis is comfortable for a few minutes. It's not much, but it's a thing he can actually do for his boyfriend and he takes it greedily.
-
Harry messes Nick up. At work, Nick's role is simple. With his family, simple. With Harry, it's not at all simple because he's hurting as much as Nick is and he has to balance the pain and it gets complicated. It's the same with the other bandmates and Louis' family, but Nick doesn't actually spend much one on one time with them, not like with Harry.
And Harry wants to talk. He wants to talk and cry and acknowledge that this is a thing that's happening, but Nick doesn't want to do any of those things. Nick wants to let it sit in the air around them and play one of Harry's terrible PlayStation games and lose horribly and let Harry mock him. He doesn't want to address how neither of them can smile quite right anymore.
But Harry wants that, he wants to talk about it and get it out and Nick can't deny him because, as much as it hurts him to do it, it seems to help Harry and Harry's pain is important to Nick. He'll push his own aside for a little while to worry about Harry's because there's not room in him for both.
“What are we gonna do?” Harry asks weakly, his head resting on Nick's shoulder, arms wrapped around his waist tightly.
“Dunno.”
Nick keeps his answers short in these conversations because Harry's not looking for answers. Or, if he is, he certainly realises that Nick doesn't have any, so he keeps his responses minimal, letting Harry talk and holding him close, offering the only kind of support he knows.
“Every day feels like the worst day of my life,” Harry says, his words wobbling where his throat is closing up.
Nick thinks about that. Because, yeah, he understands. Every day they edge closer to it and Nick feels like he can't breathe most of the time because it's unstoppable, like he's fighting against the wind and his breath is just gone.
But there's more to it than that. He thinks about seeing Louis' face each day, thinks about that feeling that floods through him at the sight and he can't write that off. So, he thinks.
“Every day is the best day of my life,” Nick says quietly, staring blankly at the wall. When he feels Harry's confused gaze on him, he brings his sight back to the real world, flicking his eyes down to Harry's for a moment. “Every day he's alive is the best day of my life,” he explains, turning back to the wall.
Harry squeezes Nick's waist, holding him closer, but he doesn't say anything else.
-
They'd agreed early on. On the bad days, Nick wouldn't stay. Louis doesn't want Nick to see him like that and Nick doesn't want Louis to feel like he has to pretend to be okay. So they had agreed. Nick wouldn't stay on the bad days.
But as time goes on and there are more bad days than good days, it's an agreement Nick finds harder and harder to keep. So, when he walks in one day and Louis' mum shakes her head, signaling that it's a bad day, Nick sighs and hesitates for a moment before marching ahead into the living room where Louis is lying on the couch.
"Nick, go home," Louis says in a monotone voice, staring at the muted TV.
Nick pauses, looking down, seeing that the purple around his eyes has darkened and the bones in his hands seem more pronounced. And, somehow, even though his eyes are dull, they're still so blue, so beautiful. He drops to his knees in front of the couch, resting his hand on top of Louis' cold ones, peering down at the boy who refuses to meet his gaze.
"I'm staying."
“No, you're bloody well not,” he says, bitterness laced through the words.
“Louis,” Nick says firmly. “You're the love of my bloody life and I just- I need to be here, come on.”
Louis goes on staring at the TV for a long moment before finally lifting his eyes and Nick can see the pain in them, all kinds of pain, more pain than any person should have to bear, especially him. Something cracks behind his face, something shifting in the blue, and he whispers like he's terrified.
“I don't want you to remember me like this.”
Nick slumps at the words, shaking his head as he pushes his hand up Louis' arm.
“I've been memorising you since we met, Lou. I have thousands of memories of your bright smile and your obnoxious laugh. Your lips and your voice and your sodding eyes, god, you wouldn't believe it. I close my eyes and I see yours, that's how burned into my memory they are.” He drops a careful kiss to Louis' wrist, letting his lips rest there, memorising the feeling of the pulse against his lips. “Those memories can't be replaced, love.”
Louis closes his eyes, wincing, and Nick pulls himself up straight. His thumb unconsciously traces over the skin on Louis' arm in a infinite pattern as he waits, feeling calmer by the moment just because he's here; he's touching Louis and he's here.
“You really have turned into a sap,” Louis says dryly, eyes still closed. “All it took was a little dying.”
Nick knows that part of staying on bad days is accepting this, accepting anything Louis will say because people say terrible things when they're in pain: constant, endless pain. Even so, Louis' words aren't biting. They're possibly insensitive, but not mean-spirited.
“Do you think you'll be a sap for your next boyfriend from the beginning or go back to the way you were?”
Louis' eyes open as he finishes the question and it's a sincere question; Nick sees the honesty in his eyes. Again, it's insensitive, maybe, but not harsh.
“Fuck if I know,” Nick answers honestly. “Fuck if I care.”
It's the best he can do to answer the question and, even so, Louis slumps even more, thin frame hunched as his eyes drift back to the TV. Nick pushes himself up to kiss Louis' forehead, feeling how cool the skin is under his lips, how fragile he feels. As he pulls away, Louis shifts up and winces again, his fingers covering Nick's.
“Kiss me,” he says quietly, looking up at Nick.
Blue, blue, blue.
And Nick drops again, kissing his chapped lips gently, slow, little kisses dotted with deep breaths. Louis' dry lips scrape against Nick's and Nick tries to kiss life into them, tries to kiss warmth and love and more fucking time into them.
-
Nick gets a text in the middle of his show from Louis' mum.
he asked for you this morning. you know he usually doesn't ask for anything, so i was hoping you could stop by after work?
Nick doesn't finish the show. He lets Matt take over and drives straight to Louis', takes the steps two at a time when Louis' mum waves him up, and he walks into the bedroom to find Louis curled up on his side in bed, eyes opening when Nick steps inside.
Ocean blue. Nick can't get enough.
"Nick." He says it like he's quietly begging for something, but Nick's not sure what.
"Hi, love," Nick says before he steps over to the bed, shifting Louis over just enough to squeeze in beside him, wrapping an arm around his shoulder and pulling him in.
He doesn't say anything, doesn't ask. He hopes Louis will ask him if he wants anything, hopes he'll say anything he wants to say. But he doesn't say anything. He rests his head on Nick's chest and breathes in and out, in and out, as Nick memorises the rhythm.
“I played you a song this morning,” Nick says quietly. “One of those ridiculous pop-meets-techno-meets-screech owl songs you love to make me listen to.”
Louis squeezes Nick weakly and it urges him to go on as rhythm of Louis' breathing gives Nick something to anchor himself to.
“And I made tea this morning instead of coffee because you always complain when I taste like coffee when we kiss. And I put on that blue shirt you always say looks good on me because it's the colour of your eyes but then I had to change because I've worn that shirt four times this week and it's getting a little musty.” Nick smiles softly, kissing the top of Louis' head. “And Matt brought in donuts and I thought of that time you ate six donuts in one sitting, do you remember? You had icing sugar all over your face and you were hopping around like a mad person for an hour before you crashed and then you didn't move for the rest of the day.”
Louis shifts so he's looking up at Nick, blue shining out against the bruised skin around them, and Nick's breath gets lost because everything's shit, everything, but he's struck in this moment by how lucky he is. Because not everyone has gotten to love Louis Tomlinson, not everyone has been loved by Louis Tomlinson. He doesn't know how those people do it, how they get by.
“My point is that even when you're not with me, you are. You're there.”
Louis smiles a tired smile and Nick leans down to kiss him, feels the bones in his shoulder shift under the skin as he turns more, chasing the kiss. Nick can feel Louis holding onto it, trying to keep the moment and he does the same, trying to stop time. When they pull away they don't really pull away. Nick lets Louis breathe against his lips, but he keeps his eyes closed, stays right there.
“I think we would have gotten married,” Louis whispers.
Nick forces down whatever it is that's rising in his chest, pushes it away. Not now. Not yet.
“I think so,” he agrees, pressing one more kiss into his lips. “Yeah.”
Nick can hear a clock ticking over the silence in the room and he hates the sound. He thinks he hears the ticking speeding up, time racing away from him, and he holds Louis closer, blocking out the noise and the inescapable feeling of dread that's weighing down on him.
-
When Nick opens the door in his pyjamas, Harry's there, eyes red and tired and he smiles forcefully like the effort to lift the corners of his lips is taking all of the energy in him.
"Hey," Harry says roughly. "Can I stay the night?"
Nick frowns, pulling the boy inside and closing the door, immediately wrapping his arms around him.
Harry cries like he hasn't really stopped crying in weeks, tired sobs squeezing out of him every once in a while, his chest heaving raggedly.
"Shh," Nick hushes into Harry's messy hair. "You need to sleep."
When Harry pulls away, he's nodding, wiping his face red. "Yeah."
Nick drags him to his bedroom by the hand, peeling off the younger boy's jacket and pulling back the comforter. Harry climbs in, not bothering to undress, and Nick lies down next to him, watching as Harry's eyelids fall before he rips them up again.
"I haven't slept in days," he says brokenly, without meeting Nick's gaze, like he's admitting a secret. "I just know when I fall asleep, he'll slip away and, when I wake up, he'll be gone."
Nick nods because he knows that feeling. He knows it every time he closes the door behind him when he leaves Louis' and every time he lies down to go to sleep. That consuming fear that he won't get any more time.
"I'm so scared," he says and Nick can feel him shaking next to him.
He scoots closer, pressing up against Harry in a comforting embrace, hugging him close as he says "shhh" again.
"I know," he whispers, running his hand over Harry's arm. "Me too."
Eventually Harry's eyes close and his breathing evens out and Nick's awake for a long time after that, thinking thoughts filled with fear, like he's racing toward a cliff and he can't slow himself down no matter how hard he slams on the brakes.
-
Nick prays the next night. He's pretty sure he's not doing it right and he doesn't even really know what he's praying for, but if there is a god, Nick wants to make sure he's paying special attention to his boy.
-
Nick's in a daze as he stands in line at Tesco, lost in thoughts of nothing with his bread and lettuce and milk on the belt next to him. When he got into the store he'd forgotten what it was he'd planned to buy, forgot if he'd even planned it at all.
The cashier is deep in conversation with the woman in front of Nick as she scans the items slowly between her words. Normally he'd be annoyed, shoot them pissy looks, but today he barely even notices.
"Oh, I know how you feel," the cashier says sweetly to the woman. "Lost my dad to cancer five years ago. Still miss him every day."
Nick blocks out the rest of the conversation, staring blankly at the rack of sweets in front of him.
He stares. He doesn't think.
Or maybe he does think or maybe it's just a physical reaction that his brain has nothing to do with. Either way he feels it hitting him, swelling rapidly in his tight chest, overtaking him like he's being swallowed by a violent wave crashing into him.
And the checkout line at Tesco is not the ideal place to break apart, but that's exactly what happens. Tears start spilling from his eyes with abandon and a sob shudders through him, escaping from his lungs, and he's trapped, people behind him and ahead of him, fixtures displaying sweets and magazines to his left and right. He's trapped and there's no stopping this, not when he's been stretched thin, trying to keep himself in check at all times for months. Now that he's finally breaking, there's absolutely no stopping it.
He ignores the looks he's getting as he leans back against the conveyor belt, letting it tear through him, his lungs gasping for breath around the sobs he's trying to contain.
His love will be gone soon. And he'll never not hurt again.
When the cashier leans forward and touches his arm tentatively, he has half a mind to ask for the manager, explain what's appropriate public conversation and what's not, but instead he slips through the opening left by the woman ahead of him moving aside, and he walks quickly toward the door, chest heaving.
His love will be gone soon.
He'll never not hurt again.
-
His ringing phone wakes him at four in the morning and he knows before he looks at the name, knows before he's even fully awake.
He pulls the phone up to his ear, hitting accept as he does so. Instead of saying anything, he swallows, listening to the familiar ragged breath on the other end for a long moment. Finally, he chokes out the words and they taste like bile in his mouth.
"He's gone?"
The breath shudders on the other end, shakes as it puffs into Nick's ear through the phone.
"Yeah. About an hour ago."
Nick's not sure what to say so he doesn't. He swallows again, tongue feeling dry and too big for his mouth and he doesn't know how long the silence stretches but it could be days for all he knows because he's starting over in this moment, beginning a life he doesn't recognize. Maybe time works differently in this new life.
"What do you need?"
Nick shakes his head, cradling the phone to his ear and breathing in air that tastes different to him now.
"Nothing," he answers, his voice sounding strange to his own ears. Because he has nothing now and he's still breathing, so apparently he doesn't need anything. "You?"
Harry breathes out another shaky breath, wet around the edges, and Nick is glad he can't see him right now.
"I don't know," he says, his voice breaking.
Nick nods to himself, agreeing. He doesn't know anything, honestly. He really doesn't know.
-
As the early morning stretches on, he sits in bed, every breath he takes like an experiment. He tests himself a little at a time. Flexing his toes. Bending his knees. Blinking. All of the little movements that he's sure should be impossible now.
He vacantly wonders if everyone can feel it, the loss. Because it seems to him that it's a loss not just for him, but for the entire fucking world. Like some of the air has been sucked out of the atmosphere.
His whole body feels numb and aches at the same time. It feels like someone has reached into his chest and torn out his organs, replacing them with a pulsing nothingness pumping the hurt through his veins until he can feel it in his fingers and his toes. It's a dull pain, though, and Nick would rather it stab into him if only to give him something to focus on.
He briefly wonders if Louis thought of him as he left then violently pushes that thought away, not ready for it.
When the sun starts appearing faintly through the window, a low hazy light that's just a taste of the sun, not quite daylight yet, Nick stands from his bed and walks to his bookshelf where he's tucked a piece of paper between two books; a piece of paper with messy handwriting scrawled across it in black biro. He wonders if it's too soon to read it again, but this is what Louis wanted. He wanted him to remember, to know.
The way I love you... it's not the kind of love that death can touch.
I love you now, as I write this. And I love you now, as you read this.
I may be temporary, but love isn't. Not this kind.
And Nick can only think that Louis is in no way temporary. His body, maybe, but not him. Not who he is. He's permanent, that boy. He's forever.
He thinks back to the day Louis had given him the piece of paper now in his hands and he remembers the story, can still hear Louis telling it.
You were driving us back to your place after a party and it was late and we were both tired and quiet because we had sobered up. I don't think we said a single word the whole drive home, but I remember thinking that it was probably the first time that happened, that it was silent between us. And it was actually nice, really nice, just being with you.
You reached down and squeezed my hand like you weren't even thinking about it. You just did it and that was probably a first, too, because you were still sort of acting like the thing between us wasn't anything real, you know? But you squeezed my hand as you drove and I couldn't stop myself from smiling at the feeling.
And when we got to yours, we went to bed, but we were too tired to do anything, so we just settled in to sleep. But you leaned over, remember? You leaned over and whispered to me 'thank you for coming tonight' and kissed me and I was already half asleep, but I remember thinking it then, clear as day, that I was in love with you.
Nick feels tears covering his cheeks and he smiles through the sob crawling up from his throat because he can still hear Louis' voice in his ear, can still feel his skin under his fingertips. All he has are his memories now and he's thankful for them in this moment, remembering how lucky he is to have loved Louis.
The sun is up now and Nick walks to the window, the paper clutched in his hand. He looks up at the clear sky and smiles to himself at the colour.
Ocean blue. Nick never did get enough.