Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Louis wakes up to his alarm and immediately doesn’t want to be alive. He just knows, he knows it’s going to be a bad day. The undercurrent of sadness that’s always there is thrumming through him today, crashing over his entire body in waves. He knows Zayn is right, and he needs to go back to therapy, but the thought of that is just too overwhelming most days. He wants to call in sick, but he knows how difficult it’s going to be for his manager, Sandra, to find someone to cover for him. Plus, he tells himself, trying to psych himself up. It’s not that bad, not as bad as some days where he actually has called in sick. It’s like a medium, or medium high. A stray thought creeps into his brain, from the cooking show he was watching last night.
‘Turn your hob to medium high,’ he remembers the presenter saying, and he actually giggles, out loud. Because is he actually measuring his depression right now like he would the temperature of a fucking frypan?

The thought is funny enough to get him out of bed. Glancing at his phone, he realises he has wallowed in bed long enough that he is actually going to be late if he doesn’t get a move on. He has just enough time for a shower, so he does that quickly, careful not to get his hair wet because he won’t have time to dry it. Thankfully, Louis washed his hair yesterday, so it will do. Back in his room, he scrambles through his clean laundry basket and quickly realises all his go-to comfy work trousers are strewn on the floor, already worn. Shit, he thinks, as he picks through them, trying to find something clean-ish to wear. The mere fact that he’s having to sniff his own trousers is yet another reminder that he needs to get his shit together. Do laundry he notes mentally, as he yanks open the drawer where his lesser worn trousers are. None of the options on the floor had proved viable, most of them having baby food, or even worse, baby puke on them. He moves aside a couple of folded pairs of black skinny jeans before he finds a pair of light wash jeans in a looser cut. Perfect. Something clean. Sighing in relief, he yanks them on, pausing a little when the button is a little tight to do up. Unpleasant thoughts seep into his brain as he races around gathering the rest of his things for work, his already sour mood easily making way for them. Has he gained weight? He swears these jeans used to fit more loosely. He has an itching urge to go and weigh himself, but thankfully for his mental stability there is no time. In the mood he’s in, seeing any number on the scale would probably derail his mood further, regardless of if he’d actually gained weight or not. He rushes out to the car in the nick of time, blasting BBC Radio 1 as he pulls out into the street. Nick Grimshaw is telling him to make it a great day before playing a sugary pop song. I’ll try Nick, he thinks, as he hums along to the music. He likes this one, Nick’s been playing it a lot this week. I’ll fucking try.

Louis arrives for work to a crazy scene, and is immediately extremely disorientated. The car park is full of people, police, people yelling and arguing. And right in the middle of it is a car, crashed smack bang into the front of the daycare centre where he works. His heart drops as he immediately thinks of the kids, panic surging through him. Was anyone inside when it happened? It’s only early, but in normal circumstances the centre should have been open for at least an hour already. And what about the driver of the car?

As his mind goes through all the worst case scenarios, he spots his centre manager, Sandra, turning away from talking to a policeman. He hurries over to her, lightly catching her shoulder to get her attention. ‘Louis!’ She says in surprise, her face looking weary. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to call you before you left.’
‘Don’t worry about that,’ he says urgently. ‘What happened? Was anyone hurt?’
‘No, thank goodness, it happened before we opened. The driver is okay, I’ll fill you in later. The centre though…’ she trails off.
Louis looks at the building, wincing. He knows nothing about architecture but it doesn’t look good, and he wouldn’t be surprised if something collapsed once the car was removed. He glances around, seeing a couple of familiar families in the car park, obviously having arrived to drop off their kids. There is a stressed looking woman in an expensive suit with two children in tow, and a concerned looking tradesman in full work gear, eyeing the building worriedly with his toddler on his hip. Louis recognises both parents from when he’s been on the early shifts. He can see they are already in conversation with other centre staff members though. He thinks it was the woman, Amy, he thinks her name is - her children are older, and not in his room - who was yelling when he arrived, but she seems to have lowered her voice now. He turns back to Sandra. ‘Do you need help with anything? Calling any families?’
She shakes her head. ‘Head office is onto it now, and I’ll be here to meet any that do turn up. I’m going to call the rest of the employees now. You can just go home. I’ll update you later about all this,’ she says, gesturing tiredly at the centre.

He nods and says goodbye, feeling a bit lost as he walks back to his car, because what the actual fuck. He supposes he should be grateful he doesn’t have to work after all, like that was what he’d wanted, right? But no, he’s frustrated because he just spent the entire drive belting song lyrics to try and drip some positivity into his soul and it had kind of worked a tiny bit, and he was actually feeling semi ready to face the workday and now there is no workday. The full realisation of this thought hits him as he gets into his car. Fuck, no work. Louis’ smart enough to realise he probably won’t be able to return to work at that centre for a long time. That building structure had looked fucked. And yeah, surely there would be some sort of compensation, or redundancy package, since he was a full-time employee and had worked there for nearly three years now. But he knows things like that can take time, caught up in red tape. He doesn’t exactly live paycheck to paycheck, but he’s not that good at saving either, wasting money on frivolous things, clothes and eating out and nights out with friends. He’s still young, after all, at only 23. But he’s kicking himself for his spending habits now. If he had actually saved, he wouldn’t have this nagging worry in his stomach about the uncertainty of his future income.

That’s how he finds himself sitting at his kitchen table with his laptop open basically as soon as got home, navigating to a website he had used a few times in the past when he was feeling broke, or just bored, to pick up babysitting work on the weekends. He sips his caffeinated frappuccino concoction he’d picked up on the way home as he figures out how to sort the ads. Said drink is probably terrible for him and he wouldn’t be surprised if his fucking loyalty card to the goddamned place is the reason his jeans are too tight but he didn’t want to think about that right now. He’s tired, and hungry, and his emotions are scattered all over the floor where he’s not dealing with them and the drink is familiar and comforting.

He decides to sort the ads parents had posted in order of urgency hoping to pick up something for tomorrow or tonight even. The first ad is for a job starting in only a few hours, early that afternoon. He almost scrolls past, assuming someone had already taken the job and the parent had just forgotten to take the post down. But then he pauses. If the job hadn’t been taken yet, the parent must be getting quite frantic. He pulled out his mobile and typed in the number listed, next to the contact name ‘Harry’. He pauses to collect himself for a second, taking a deep breath, trying to quell the anxiety that is fuelling his job search so that he can actually talk on the phone. Social anxiety is actually one of the few things he doesn’t normally struggle with, but he’s feeling very highly strung right now. He remembers a sort of a cheat sheet he’d written up for calls like this in the past, with a greeting and things he needed to remember to say. He brings it up and is comforted by the notes, and feeling ready, dials the number.

The phone rings for so long and Louis is sure it’s going to go to the answer phone, until the line clicks and a deep, male voice says ‘Hello?’
Louis straightens, immediately launching into his spiel. ‘Hi, my name is Louis Tomlinson and I’m a childcare provider. I am calling in response to your ad for a babysitter, am I speaking with Harry?’
‘Yes, this is Harry,’ continues the voice. ‘Oh god - wow, yes, does that mean you can come this afternoon?’ His voice seems naturally slow and melodic, but it was speeding up slightly, like he was trying to get his words out faster.
‘Yes, absolutely. My DBS certificate, qualifications, and references are all on my profile on the website,’ he replies, pleased with how the call is going so far. ‘I can send you a private message on the site so that you can have a quick look through, if you like?’ He’s prepared, he knows people usually like to be thorough when hiring someone to look after their children.
‘Yes, that would be great.’ Harry’s voice changes slightly, sounding a little unsure, nervous. ‘I’ll just view the DBS certificate for now, and I’ll have a look at the rest later, if I need - I’d prefer just to ask you a few questions over the phone, if you like?’
‘That’s perfectly fine, I’ll send you it now.’ Louis responds, putting Harry on speaker and texting him a picture of his DBS certificate, it would be quicker for him to view that way, and he hopes Harry appreciates his efficiency. He likes to make a good impression, even for once off jobs like this. He takes the phone off speaker and presses it back to his ear, waiting for Harry. His voice comes back on the line quickly.
‘Thanks for sending that through. Now, erm, my daughter, she’s very small - d’you have much experience with newborns?
Well thank fuck. ‘Yes actually, I normally work in the nursery room at a daycare. It’s my day off today.’
Harry laughs. It’s not elegant, like his voice, but Louis likes it better that way. ‘I guess I’m lucky you are apparently not wanting to enjoy your day off like a normal person,’ he said, echoing Louis’ thought from earlier. ‘I was stressing out. I’m not sure what I would have done if you hadn’t called.’
Louis smiles to himself. He is glad he called too. It appears he has gotten this man out of a bind. ‘I’m happy to help. How old exactly is your daughter, by the way?’ He is wondering if he has any toys she might like. For someone with no children of his own, he has amassed a small collection of children’s toys. He likes to bring them to jobs like this, and when he’s looking after his siblings. Children tend to get bored of their own toys very quickly and get very excited over something new. People tend to use the term newborn very loosely, so he wants to make sure he brings something age appropriate.
‘She’s five weeks now,’ Harry says excitedly, and holy hell did he just say five weeks? Louis cannot for the life of him remember when he last looked after a baby that young. Most of the new babies he gets in his room start daycare around 6 months, he thinks the youngest he’s had recently started around 3 or 4 months old. He is most certainly not telling Harry that though.
‘So precious!’ He replies. ‘Were there some more questions you wanted to ask me?’
‘Oh! Yes, erm… how many years have you worked in childcare for?’
‘Four years, as a career. But I have six siblings, all of them younger than me, so I’ve had plenty of experience looking after them as well.’
‘Wow!’ Harry replies, laughing again. ‘What a big family. Well, anyway Louis, thanks for putting up with my questions. I just get nervous, leaving her with someone new. I know the ad said one, but do you think you could be here by half twelve? I’d like to have time to go through everything properly. If not, one is fine,’ he tacks on, nervously. Louis assures him that’s fine - it’s not even past nine in the morning yet, to be fair - and they hang up, once Louis quickly confirms Harry is okay with his rates. His phone buzzes a minute later with Harry’s address, and in turn he private messages Harry on the babysitting website, inviting Harry to view his profile.

Louis sighs in relief once that’s all done, giving himself a metaphorical pat on the back for adulting the shit out of that. Yes, it’s one babysitting job. He knows this. But he also knows himself, and he knows he was very, very close to just going back to bed and shutting the world out for the rest of the day and night. He hasn’t done that, and he’s proud of himself. He is again proud of himself a second later when he realises he has some time to fill in before leaving for Harry’s and oh my god he should do his fucking laundry.

After Louis has shoved as many of the baby sick covered clothes into the washing machine as will fit, he wanders into the bathroom, thinking he might do his hair. He normally doesn’t bother, just tries to remember to wash it every day or two and blow dries it into a soft side swept fringe, because it looks like shit if he leaves it to air dry and Louis may be depressed but he’s also vain. Said vanity is also the reason he does like to put a bit more effort in if he’s got time. He fiddles with his hair product, slicking the sides back and teasing the long top section of his hair into a quiff. He’s also come to realise, mainly in the last six months since his mental health has deteriorated, that putting in a little extra effort into his appearance can sometimes help boost his mood a little. It doesn’t always work, but some days, Louis will take anything he can get.

By the time he finally gets back in his car, ready to go to Harry’s, Louis is surprised to find he feels kind of – good? He kind of wants to tell someone, wants to text Niall and Zayn, and maybe his mum, tell them that somehow he’s managed to pull himself out slightly of the awful shitty hole he’d woken up in, and he hasn’t let the freak accident at work derail him completely, in fact, he actually picked up temporary work. And he did his fucking laundry. He pulls out his phone, smiling, starting a message to Zayn but then he stops. Instead, he brings up the maps app and puts in Harry’s address, starting the car. He’s afraid if he tells his friends and family of his accomplishments, they’ll just bring up the topic of going back to therapy, because in order to describe the significance of said accomplishments he has to also describe how bad his moods can get. And, yeah, Niall and his mum might not bring it up because they have no idea of the full story. But Zayn does, Zayn knows everything and Zayn is the one he particularly wants to tell. But Zayn is desperate for Louis to go back to therapy and Louis knows it’s because his friend is so, so worried about him. He has a moment of clarity then. For the first time, he can see the path he wants to take. He realises how selfish it is of him to have Zayn be the sole person to know the full extent of his mental health issues. This wasn’t a conscious decision he’d made, Zayn had found out, caught him. But still, it wasn’t fair. And for the first time, a small part of Louis wants to go back to therapy. A huge part of him is still fucking terrified, but hey, baby steps. He wants it though, because he wants to hang onto this unfamiliar mixture of positive emotions that he’s sure will slip away at any second. But when he gets to Harry’s a few minutes later, the feeling of pride is still there, tucked up beside his heart, even having swelled a little since his revelation. And the weird, kind of okay, kind of good feeling is still there, dancing through his body, stomping on negative thoughts and swirling through his sadness and anxiety, making everything seem just a tiny bit easier.

Louis is not quite sure he had an image of Harry in his brain, exactly, but he is quite sure the man who greets him at the door of the flat is not Harry. Until he opens his mouth and says, in the exact same voice from the phone, ‘Hi, I’m Harry.’ He holds out his hand to Louis to shake, and as he smiles Louis realises he has fucking dimples, which is really just the icing on the cake because the rest of Harry is bloody gorgeous as well. He has long hair down to his shoulders that curls sweetly around his sharp jawline and perfect, arched eyebrows framing his big green eyes. He’s also much younger than Louis expected, around his own age. 
‘Louis,’ he replies, shaking Harry’s hand firmly in return, forcing his mind to stop thinking about Harry’s pretty hair. That’s highly unprofessional of him. As he follows Harry into the flat, he takes in the rest of Harry. He is wearing black skinny jeans and a colourful patterned button up, an outfit honestly not too far from what some of the dads at his daycare might wear to pick up their kids. But he has never, ever seen one of those men pair the ensemble with a pair of honest to god, gold glittery heeled boots. He also notices, as he follows Harry into the kitchen, that his hair is not quite as perfect as it looked from the front. A patch at the back looks a little worse for wear, a bit frizzy looking, and Louis is ninety-nine percent sure it’s from his baby tugging on it. Louis likes this. It makes Harry seem less perfect and intimidating, gold boots be damned.
‘So!’ Harry says, turning around when they reach the kitchen. ‘She’s still sleeping, which is good, so I can show you everything.’
Louis nods, smiling back. ‘Fire away.’

Louis learns very quickly that Harry is a very, very good dad. He explains where everything is, his daughter's feeding and sleep schedule, has an extensive list of phone numbers should Louis need anything, because apparently Harry can’t always answer his own mobile at work. He even made Louis dinner. Louis is impressed, he has rocked up to jobs before to a houseful of screaming kids and parents running out the door the instant he arrives. He appreciates how thorough Harry is.

Harry is mid-sentence when his eyes brighten, the corner of his mouth turning up in a smile and then Louis hears it, a soft wail coming from a closed door. He instantly rushes past Louis, walking quickly but quietly to the closed door, carefully opening it, and returning a minute later with a tiny, tiny baby snuggled into his shoulder.

Louis is instantly transported to just over a year ago, when his twin siblings were born. They were so, so, tiny, just like this little girl, and Louis can’t quite believe she’s five weeks, she looks too small. He wonders if she’s a preemie.  Harry’s large hand basically encompasses her entire back, the other tenderly resting against her head and neck. Harry looks up and beams at him, and he looks so proud, but also a little emotional, and Louis thinks it might be because of this that he’s not as distracted by Harry’s beauty but instead notices the dark shadows under his eyes and a crease between his eyebrows. He doesn’t get time to dwell on this though, because Harry is speaking again.
‘Come meet my daughter,’ he says, moving over to sit on the couch. Louis follows him. They sit down and Harry re-positions the baby so her head and neck are resting in the crook of his elbow, so Louis can see her face. She still looks sleepy from her nap, her face scrunched up and she is squirming a little. There’s a little bit of dark hair on her head, unusual for a child this young.  God, Louis loves babies.
‘I was hoping she would wake up before I had to leave,’ Harry says softly. ‘I wanted to say goodbye.’ The baby is waking up now, blinking open eyes a paler shade of green than Harry’s. Louis is mesmerised. ‘Would you like to hold her?’ He asks. Louis nods eagerly, holding out his arms for the tiny infant. Harry shifts his position on the couch, moving closer to Louis, carefully transferring her to his arms. The baby is warm against Louis’ skin, and she looks up at him inquisitively.
‘Her name’s Ariel,’ he says quietly.
‘Ariel,’ repeats Louis. ‘Hi Ariel,’ he coos, grinning at the baby.
‘I’m a bit sad,’ Harry says suddenly, and Louis looks up, concerned. There is that crease in the middle of Harry’s eyebrows again. Harry continues speaking before Louis can continue saying anything. ‘It’s just - I read all those references and your credentials on your profile. It’s really rare to find someone like you. I really, desperately need a reliable full time nanny and it’s been a huge struggle to find the right person. I guess I’m just sad you already have another job.’
Louis finds himself a little endeared by the praise. Sheesh, he literally just met this guy. ‘I might be able to help you out, still. See, the daycare I work at won’t be open for a while. I turned up to work this morning to find a car had crashed into it. The building’s pretty damaged, it’ll take a while to fix.’
Harry looks horrified, his full lips parting slightly in surprise. ‘Was anyone hurt?’ Louis shakes his head, no, and explains that it had happened before the daycare opened, and that Sandra had told him the driver was okay. When Louis finishes explaining, Harry was checking his watch, frowning. 
‘I’ve gotta get going Louis, I’m so sorry. But please think about it. If you want a job, I’m offering you one. Full time hours, but they’re shit hours, I’ll warn you. We can chat when I get back, if you’re interested.’
Louis nods wordlessly as Harry bends over his lap to kiss his daughter on the forehead. He watches Harry as he leaves, the heels of his ridiculous boots clicking softly on the tiled floor of the kitchen as he exits the small flat.

Chapter Text

Ariel cries a little when she realises her father is no longer present, but settles down quite quickly. After that, she proves to be a delight, seeming to take quite quickly to him and Louis quite enjoys his afternoon. Louis had been a little apprehensive, since he hadn’t really looked after a baby this young since the twins were born. But of course, he hasn’t forgotten anything. In the quiet periods, he starts looking up psychologists on his phone, reading their specialties and reviews. He kind of wants someone that has a few specialties, he doesn’t want to start with one person only for them to tell him that someone else would be better qualified to help him with a particular issue. Sometimes, thinking about just how much was wrong with him would send him into a tailspin of negative thoughts, and this had actually been a massive barrier to him even getting to this stage, of looking up doctors. But the feeling of okayness was still there, helping to abate these thoughts. And of course, he had his good old fashioned strategy of seeking comfort in human contact when things started to get a bit much. He’d gotten so predictable at this, especially when he’d been hauling himself out of a particularly nasty negative mindset a few months ago. It had gotten to the point where Zayn would instantly know Louis was having a rough moment if he stopped what he was doing to pick up and cuddle a baby, any baby. Sometimes he’d even just hug Zayn if he was closest, which was a little embarrassing to look back on, but oh well. Louis chuckles out loud at the memory, smiling. Another memory of that time rises to the surface as he cuddles Ariel, and Louis lets himself sink into it.

‘Louis,’ Zayn asked warily, looking up from where he was cleaning out the fridge. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Yeah,’ Louis replied defensively. ‘Just give me a minute.’ He had abandoned his post at the sink where he’d been washing up bottles, binkies, and teethers to come and pick up Kaelie, a chubby six month old who had been lying happily on the floor. The boring task of washing up had allowed his mind to wander, letting in all too eager intrusive thoughts. Most of the babies were sleeping at the moment, and the ones that weren’t seemed content on their own, so Zayn had wanted to make the most of the time to clean. Which was fine, except the thoughts kept tumbling into Louis’ tired mind. The classic one telling him he wasn’t good enough, branching off and petering out into specifics. The shameful memory of how he’d almost lost his job. How he was now single and no one would ever want somebody so broken. How, even though he badly wanted the companionship of a partner, he was terrified of being manipulated again. He was hoping one of the babies would wake up or become fussy so he’d have an excuse to pick them up, to feel the warmth against his chest to soothe his ugly thoughts. But they were being annoyingly good. So, when it had gotten a bit much, he’d just decided to pick Kaelie up anyway.
‘We shouldn’t just leave them on the floor by themselves for ages, Zayn, even if they are being good. They need attention, and companionship,’ he continued, his tone still defensive.
‘More like you need attention and companionship Lou.’ Said Zayn, his voice soft. ‘Which is absolutely fine, I know the past few weeks you’ve been through absolute hell. And I’m so, so proud of you for all the progress you’ve made.’
Louis’ cold heart warmed a little at the praise. ‘Thanks,’ he said quietly.
‘You’re still doing okay? No setbacks?’ Zayn asked, sounding concerned.
Louis bristled a little at the question. No of course he was not okay, but he knew what Zayn meant. Zayn meant, could he be trusted to do his job.
‘No setbacks,’ he said quietly. He doesn’t add how every day is so bloody hard, the struggle it is to just get through it. But he could do his job, he knew he could do it. It was one of the few things he was sure of right now. And that’s all Zayn needed to know.
‘Good,’ Zayn said, smiling at him. ‘That’s so good to hear, Lou.’ He shut the fridge and moved over to check the feeding schedule. ‘You can keep holding her. She’s due for a bottle soonish anyway. I’ll make it up now.’

Louis lifts himself out of the memory, remembering his relief and the comfort he felt at being allowed to continue holding Kaelie a little longer her presence soothing his jagged nerves just like Ariel is doing now. There is something about babies that is just so comforting. Unlike in the memory, he now feels somewhat ready to acknowledge everything that had happened.

Sandra texts him while he’s eating the delicious pasta Harry had made for him, after he had put Ariel to bed for the evening, saying basically what he’d expected, that they would be closed until further notice while the building damage was assessed and repaired. After his extremely pleasant afternoon, he honestly was quite keen to take Harry up on his offer. It was a nice change of pace from his busy nursery room, though hopefully he’d still be able to go back to that job at some point.

He’s finishing up washing his dishes when he hears the lock click and Harry enters the small flat. He looks tired, but smiles as he looks up and sees Louis. He quickly removes his gold boots at the door, obviously not wanting to make too much noise and disturb Ariel. 
‘How was she?’ He asks softly, as he pads over to where Louis stands in the kitchen in his socked feet.
‘She was so good,’ Louis replies, smiling. ‘We had a lovely afternoon.’
Harry brightened visibly as he pours himself a tall glass of chilled water from the fridge. ‘I’m so glad. D’you want some?’ He asks, indicating to the water he is pouring.
Louis shakes his head. ‘Already helped myself,’ he said, indicating to his half-drunk can of flavoured mineral water, the closest thing he could find to a fizzy drink in Harry’s fridge. Harry nods in approval, putting the water away. ‘D’you think you might want to look after Ariel again, then?’
‘Yeah, I think so.’ Louis feels nervous all of a sudden, though he can’t pinpoint why. ‘I have a few questions about the job - do you have time to chat about it now?’
Harry nods enthusiastically. ‘Absolutely, let’s go sit on the couch.’
Louis agrees, heading over to the two seater couch tucked into the corner of the small living room. Harry is, apparently, the kind of person who uses coasters he notes, as he places his can of mineral water on top of the aforementioned object, sitting conveniently on the coffee table.
‘So,’ Harry says, as he plops down on the sofa beside Louis. ‘What do you want to know?’ He looks relaxed, but tired, as he sinks into the soft couch cushions, angling his body slightly towards Louis.
‘Erm… well you said before the hours are shit? What does that mean exactly?’
Harry laughs lightly. ‘Well you might have noticed I don’t exactly have a nine to five job. I’m a musician, a singer to be specific. Sometimes I’ll have gigs that go quite late.’
Louis is intrigued. He had once considered a career in music himself, and even to this day still dabbled in songwriting occasionally when he got inspired. ‘That’s really cool,’ he replies earnestly. ‘Would I know any of your songs?’
Harry grimaces a little. ‘Probably not. I just released my first single, but there’s only one station really playing it. I had all these promo dates booked, y’know, interviews and stuff to get my name out there. But it all had to be cancelled, ‘cause of -’ Harry breaks off then, the expression on his face changing suddenly as he inhales sharply. Sadness washes over his features, obliterating every trace of his earlier laughter. And it startles Louis, because the expression just looks so heartbreaking on Harry’s features, making him look impossibly young and lost.
‘Anyway,’ Harry continues, his voice sounding a little strained. ‘It just had to be cancelled. So you probably won’t know the song.’ He shifts slightly on the couch, looking a little awkward as he looks down, fidgeting with his hands.
Louis hesitates, then leans forward, placing his hand comfortingly on Harry’s closest knee, which is bare from the rip in his jeans, hoping the contact won’t be considered unwelcome by the other man. Harry really looks like he needs a hug, to be honest, but they are basically strangers so Louis thinks that might be a bit weird. Harry looks up at the touch, his green eyes huge.
‘I’d still like to hear it, if you’d let me?’ He asks softly, making eye contact with Harry. And then, ever so slightly, the corner of Harry’s mouth twitches up into a small smile, and Louis is so pleased, because he caused that, he caused that little bit of joy to creep back onto Harry’s face.
‘Of course,’ Harry says, a little bit of excitement creeping into his voice. And then he is up, and Louis’ hand feels cold suddenly as it slides off the warmth of Harry’s knee, the skin-to-skin contact broken as the other man gets up from the couch and crosses the room to rummage in the duffel bag he’d deposited by the door upon entering the flat. He returns quickly, with a phone and a huge pair of expensive looking headphones in hand. He slides back onto the couch, still angling his body toward Louis but sitting closer than before, their knees bumping together slightly as Harry settles himself on the couch. 
‘Here,’ he says, passing Louis the headphones as he jams the end of the cord into his phone. ‘Now, it’s okay if you don’t like it, I won’t be offended, and I have lots of other songs too, and they all sound different, so…’ his voice trails off, and he looks up at Louis nervously.
‘Harry,’ says Louis, gently but firmly, as he locks eyes with Harry, placing the headphones over his ears. ‘Play the song.’
Harry is completely still for a beat or so as he maintains the eye contact with Louis, then he quickly looks away, down at his phone where he taps away at it a few times, and then music is filling Louis’ ears.

After a few bars he’s sure he’s heard the song before, it’s niggling at the corner of his brain. He thinks it’s the high quality headphones that are throwing him off, normally he has the radio on in the car or in the background at work, played through crappy speakers and often drowned out by a crying baby. Then the chorus begins in full fanfare, and the beautiful voice he now knows belongs to the man sitting in front of him melts into his eardrums. He gasps aloud, removing the headphones.
‘Watermelon Sugar!’ He exclaims. ‘You’re Harry Styles?’
Harry looks excited, and surprised. ‘You know the song?’ He asks cautiously. ‘You know me?’
Louis nods. ‘How could I not, oh my god that DJ Nick Grimshaw is obsessed with you. Have you considered a restraining order?’
A flood of giggles escapes Harry’s mouth, which delights Louis. 
‘Oh my god,’ he says, catching his breath a little as he grins at Louis. ‘Seriously, I’ve tried to tell him that’s how it comes across. He’s my friend, actually, and he’s very loyal, and protective of me. He’s just been trying to help me out, in his own way.’
‘If you say so,’ Louis replies, smirking a little.
‘So does that mean you like the song?’ Harry asks, a little breathlessly, a hopeful look on his face, and Louis thinks it might be the loveliest expression he’s seen on Harry’s face yet, and it’s endearing as well as slightly frustrating, because he looks the youngest he’s looked yet, and he really needs to fucking figure out how old Harry Styles is because it’s driving him crazy.
‘I love the song,’ says Louis, and it’s true. He’s definitely jammed out to it a few times in the car on the way to work.
‘Good,’ says Harry, smiling shyly, and it might just be the cutest thing ever. ‘It’d be really awkward if you were going to work for me and hated my music.’
God, Louis needs to get a fucking grip. He needs to focus, actually focus instead of waxing poetic in his head about Harry’s smiles, and dimples, and how he wants to make Harry laugh, and how he doesn’t want him to be sad. Taking this job is a very, very bad idea, for a multitude of reasons, but Louis is one hundred percent sure he is going to take it, for one very simple reason: now that Harry Styles has waltzed into his life, he doesn’t think he can let him leave.

He takes a deep breath, steadying himself. ‘So is that all I need to deal with? A few late nights? Doesn’t sound too bad.’
Harry winces. ‘That, and some early mornings as well. And I have gigs most Friday and Saturday nights. And I probably won’t always be able to give you two days off in a row.’
Louis wonders if hearing Harry’s angelic voice through those expensive headphones has actually melted his brain. This sounds like the shittiest job in the world. He sleep pattern is going to be fucked, and it sounds like he could basically kiss his social life goodbye. He can see why Harry has been having such a hard time finding a nanny. And yet, he’s still pretty fucking sure the position will end up being filled, by him, against his better judgement.

Louis is positive he’s actually, completely lost his mind when instead of politely declining, he hears himself asking. ‘What are the early mornings for? And what’s the likelihood of them being like, the morning after you have a late gig?’
Harry sighs, that little crease between his eyebrows pinching as he rubs his face. ‘The mornings are so I can try and schedule the radio and TV promo again. But I absolutely must have childcare set in stone before I approach them again. It was a really bad look when I cancelled everything the first time and I doubt they’d want to hear from me again if I had to cancel a second time. And as for if it would be the morning after a late gig, maybe. I don’t know yet. But I was thinking, for nights like that, you could just take her to your place, maybe? That might be easier.’

Louis has so many questions swimming in his still conflicted mind, and he tries to fish one out to ask but before he can, Harry ploughs on.
‘Look Louis, I’m going to be straight up with you. I’m a single dad with basically no support system. I don’t have any family here, the friends I do have have their own lives and to be honest I wouldn’t trust half of them with her anyway, they’re too young and don’t know anything about babies.’ Harry rolls his eyes dramatically, then looks down, fidgeting with his hands again. ‘I’m struggling, and I’m scared my career is going to go down the toilet before it even starts because I can’t get my shit together,’ he finishes quietly, still not looking up.

And, well, fuck. Louis is well fucked now. Even if he had had the best intentions of declining the job (which, let’s be honest, he never did) he can’t very well do it now after that little speech of Harry’s. 
‘Harry,’ he says, and he feels the urge to touch Harry again, to comfort him, but he resists the urge, for now. ‘How old are you?’
Harry sniffs, still not looking up, and fuck, is he crying? Louis is sure his heart will be ripped out if Harry cries.
‘M’twenty-one,’ he says, quietly, slowly, and then he does look up, making eye contact with Louis again, and he’s not crying, not quite, but his eyes seem a little glossier than before. And it makes so much sense, of course he is twenty-one, a number right around the middle of the multitude of ages his face seems to wear. 
‘Harry Styles,’ he begins, and says a big fuck it to his brain, his conscience, the universe, everything, as he decides to reach out and take one of Harry’s hands in both of his. It’s larger than he expected, and his own hands feel positively tiny against it, zipping with electricity against the contrast of Harry’s warm skin and cool rings. ‘I think you just might have your shit more together than any twenty-one year old I’ve ever met.’
Harry stares at him incredulously, and Louis’ heart soars as he sees genuine amusement, replacing, for the second time that night, the sadness that had been on Harry’s face.
‘You really don’t know me at all,’ he says, shaking his head. 
‘Well, we literally did just meet today,’ Louis quips, quirking his mouth into what he hopes is an endearing smile. ‘I accept the job, by the way.’
Harry’s mouth falls open, his fingers gripping Louis’ tightly. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Yup. Go ahead and book all the breakfast radio interviews you want. I’ll look after Ariel. I won’t let you down. I’ll help you.’ And he does mean it. More than anything, he feels an overwhelming urge to just help Harry, just make his life a little easier. 

Louis is startled suddenly by a light scratch on his palm from one of Harry’s rings as Harry extricates his hand from his, to promptly knock Louis against the armrest of the couch as he launches himself forward and embraces Louis, flinging his arms around Louis so hard it actually hurts a bit. Louis can hardly breathe for multiple reasons, but he lets himself melt tentatively into his embrace, wrapping a hand cautiously around Harry’s back to return the hug, his fingers tangling absentmindedly in Harry’s long hair. Harry pulls back, and Louis’ fingers slip from his hair, his back as he does, and Harry is almost too quick to turn around, but Louis catches it, a single tear slipping down his cheek before he quickly hides his face.
‘Harry,’ he says softly, concerned. ‘Are you okay?’
‘No,’ he says, still looking away, scrubbing at his face quickly with his hands. ‘I mean - sorry, I think I’m just relieved,’he says, turning back finally to look at Louis. 
Louis studies his face. He looks exhausted, and sad, and he doesn’t want to leave Harry like this, doesn’t want this conversation to end with what feels like so much left unsaid. But Harry looks like he needs sleep, and so does Louis for that matter. 
‘What time should I start tomorrow?’

Chapter Text

Louis closes his laptop with a satisfying click, satisfied with how the meeting with Harry’s management had gone. He was very happy with how his contract negotiations had gone. He’d be earning more than at his previous job, and since he wouldn’t really have time to go out on weekends anymore, he might actually save some fucking money for once in his life. That’s what he kept telling himself anyway. That this job was the chance to get his life on track, do the whole adulting thing properly. Unfortunately, Louis was lying to himself. The sole reason he had taken the job was because he couldn’t say no to Harry fucking Styles.

It wasn’t even his slightly debilitating crush on the man, he thought, as he checked he had everything before leaving for Harry’s. Although, that was definitely a factor. No, it was the fact that Louis just wanted to do everything possible to make his life easier. It has started with how grateful and relieved he’d been on their first phone call, and had just spiralled from there.

Wait. Maybe that was due to his infatuation with the man after all, and not due to simply being a good person or whatever he was trying to fucking tell himself. Regardless, Louis is screwed, utterly and royally screwed. See, aside from the fact that Harry is literally his boss, there is also the fact that Harry had to have slept with a woman at least once to produce his own offspring, which in Louis’ mind, significantly reduces the chance of him even liking men. And he knows, objectively, that that’s silly. Sexuality can be fluid and he shouldn’t assume, not when he knows next to nothing about the man or the situation. But the defeatist part of his brain is clouding, poisoning his thoughts, telling him that things will never work out well for him.

Not to mention, the existence of this mysterious woman, Ariel’s mother. Not one person, not Harry, not his management has mentioned hide nor hair of her. It is unusual for a baby this young to not have contact with her mother, even if the parents aren’t together. But Harry had said he had no family and no support system in London, so Ariel’s mother must not live here, or be unable to care for her. Louis is dying of curiosity, but unless his mouth completely betrays him, he knows he probably won’t ask, at least not until they’ve gotten to know each other better. He doesn’t want to be rude, or make Harry uncomfortable, or upset him, or whatever negative emotion the question might provoke. He doesn’t want Harry to feel any negative emotions at all. God, Louis thinks. He’s in so deep it’s embarrassing and he’s only known the man for about twenty-four hours.

Once he pulls up outside Harry’s building, Louis shakes himself as he gets out of the car. He tries to wrangle his emotions into something resembling a professional, capable employee as he makes his way up to Harry’s flat. 

‘Hi!’ Harry says brightly as he opens the door, barely seconds after Louis has knocked. He is smiling, but he looks even more tired than he did the night before, and his hair is a complete mess, frizzy and tied up in some sort of bun-slash-ponytail creation right on top of his head. Louis’ not quite sure what to call it, and he doubts Harry knows either. He is apparently still wearing his pyjamas, unless he is making a bold fashion choice in pink tracksuit bottoms and a Care Bears t-shirt. He looks adorable.

‘Hey,’ Louis says, smiling softly as he comes inside, closing the door behind him and hanging his coat up. Ariel, he notes, is lying on a soft rug in the living room, a mobile placed above her in her eyesight with black and white patterned objects for her to gaze at, like Louis knows very young babies love. Once Louis sees she is content and entertained, he turns his attention back to Harry, who is now in the kitchen, putting various cut vegetables into two glass jars in front of him.  ‘What’s that?’ He asks.

Harry looks up at him happily, smiling again. ‘Our lunch!’ He replies, continuing to place vegetables into the jars, topping them with some sort of salad leaves.

‘Harry, you don’t have to make me food, you know,’ he says, eyeing the salad suspiciously. It looks very green.

‘But I do!’ Harry says indignantly, eyes wide. ‘Did you not read your contract? It says, ‘meals will be provided during work hours'.'

‘Yes, Harold, I did read my contract,’ he replies. He’s not sure where the nickname slips from, but Harry looks a little endeared, and doesn’t seem to mind. ‘That’s how I know it actually says, ‘meals or food allowance will be provided.’ Can’t you just leave me money for pizza or something?’

Harry stills, his hand frozen on one of the lids of the jars. He looks up, his expression crestfallen. ‘Do you not want this?’ He asks softly.

And fuck, fuck all things damned to hell because Louis does not want that salad. But, he’s not going to say that to Harry, not when he looks dead on his feet and has spent the time to make food for Louis. ‘Of course I want it,’ he says, soothingly. ‘I just mean, like, if you don’t have the time, don’t worry. I can just make a sandwich or something with whatever’s in the fridge.’

Harry nods slowly, considering, resuming placing the lids on the jars. ‘It honestly didn’t take me that much time today, cause I wanted to make one for myself to take to work anyway. It’s pretty easy to double the quantity. But I might let you make your own, on days when I’m short on time, as long as you’re okay with that?’

Louis nods vehemently. ‘That’s absolutely fine with me.’

Harry nods, apparently satisfied with the outcome of the conversation, turning to put one of the jars in the fridge. Louis turns as well, deciding he wants to pick up Ariel, to say hello to her and to feel her cuddly warmth against his chest. He moves the mobile out of the way and kneels down, carefully placing one hand under her head and neck, the other under her lower back before lifting her to cradle against his chest, pausing to make sure she is secure before he stands up.

When he turns around, Harry is watching him quietly. His hands are semi-clasped in front of him, his long fingers twisting nervously together. They are bare of rings today. Louis notices some small tattoos on his left hand and wrist that his brain must have skimmed over the previous night, with everything else going on. The shorter sleeves of his t-shirt reveal a larger piece of ink on his forearm, a mermaid, by the looks.
‘I want to go shower,’ Harry says. ‘And nap before work. Actually, maybe nap first. I don’t know.’ His voice trails off faintly as he unclasps his hands and raises them to scrub at his eyes. Even though he is taller than Louis, he looks impossibly small and fragile in that moment.

‘Was she restless? Last night?’ Louis asks, concerned.

‘Yeah. I feel like I’ve barely slept.’

‘Go and sleep, I’ve got her. When did she last eat?’

‘Erm,’ Harry pauses for a second, scrunching his eyes shut. ‘I think I wrote it down, I don’t know, I was so tired.’ He wanders over to the kitchen, picks up a notepad, squinting at it. ‘Like, two hours ago. I think.’

‘Okay, thanks. I’ll see if she wants some more formula soon. Now I’m serious, go to sleep.’

Harry nods, smiling at him gratefully as he turns to head into his bedroom. Louis follows him, and Harry looks at him strangely when he realises Louis has followed him into his room.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Confiscating your baby monitor.’

Harry sighs. ‘There’s no point. If I’m not up by the time she wakes up from her next nap I’ve slept too long anyway.’

‘Don’t care, I’m taking it anyway.’ Louis replies, stubbornly, picking it up from the bedside table with one hand while carefully maintaining his hold on Ariel with the other. ‘Sweet dreams!’ He calls cheerily as he exits the room. 

Louis is sitting at the kitchen counter researching formula feeding schedules for newborns on his phone when Harry emerges from the bathroom about an hour and a half later. He still looks tired, but a lot more refreshed and put together. His hair is styled and he’s wearing a pink polka dotted button up with not very many of said buttons done up, exposing the edges of more tattoos on his abdomen and by his collarbones, mostly hidden by the fabric. Louis wonders what they are.

‘Is she sleeping?’ Harry asks.

Louis nods. ‘Went down after her bottle. How about you, how was your nap?’

‘Not long enough,’ Harry sighs. ‘But I’ve got to get to the studio now.’

‘I was thinking,’ says Louis. ‘I might take her to mine when she wakes up? If that’s okay with you? And bring her back in the morning?’

Harry frowns. ‘Are you sure? She wakes up, like, a lot. You’re going to have a crappy sleep.’

Louis smiles. ‘That’s kind of the point, Harry. I want you to have a good sleep.’

Harry bites his lip, considering. ‘Okay,’ he agrees. ‘We’ll try it,’ Harry really must be pretty exhausted, Louis thinks, surprised at Harry’s quick acceptance of the offer. He’d been prepared for more protesting. ‘Do you need the car seat or do you have one?’ Harry continues. As he says this, Harry’s eyes widen in slight horror. ‘Oh my god, I am so impolite. I haven’t even asked you a single thing about yourself. Do you have kids of your own? A family?’

Louis chuckles at Harry’s obvious distress. ‘Harry, it’s okay. We literally just met yesterday. There’s plenty of time to get to know each other. To answer your question, no, I don’t have kids of my own yet, though I do have lots of siblings, some of them babies. I don’t have my own car seats though, I normally just swap cars with my mum when I look after them.’

Harry nods. ‘Then we’ll swap cars too, that’s easiest.’ He cocks his head slightly, considering Louis. ‘You said you don’t have kids yet, are you planning a family?’

Louis feels his cheeks heat with embarrassment. He hadn’t considered quite the way that might sound. It just seemed like such an obvious fact, already clear in his mind that he would have children someday, that’s how it had come out. ‘Um, no actually - I mean, I’m single. I just know I definitely want kids at some point.’

Harry looks at him thoughtfully, is silent and staring for maybe a beat longer than is comfortable, before looking around and locating a set of keys on the kitchen bench.
‘It’s the blue Mazda, parked near the lift in the basement.’ He says, handing Louis the keys. ‘Take the bassinet in my room if you don’t have a cot.’

Louis nods, taking the keys and heading over to where his coat is hanging by the door, rummaging in the pockets for his own keys. He can’t remember if he has a fucking cot. He knows the twins have slept in his flat, side by side in a large porta-cot. But his brain is not working, and he can’t think of anything much right now except for Harry’s thoughtful stare and his eye contact and his tattoos and - oh god, his brain is a mess. Where is the cot? He doesn’t know.

He finally locates his keys and turns around, getting a slight shock when he realised Harry has migrated over to lean against the end of the kitchen bench closer to the door, meaning he is now almost right in front of Louis. ‘Erm,’ Louis stammers, fumbling with his keys as he struggles to separate the car key from his house keys. He will need those, after all, to get into his own flat, and he is pleased his brain has remembered this, at least, in its somewhat derailed state. ‘I parked just down the street. The silver Fiat.’

Harry nods, gently taking the keys from Louis, who makes a very undignified squawking sound in protest, and Harry shushes him, actually shushes him.
‘It’s okay,’ he says, reaching into the crown of his hair, where his hair is pinned into a quiff, and removes a bobby pin. Evidently, there is more than one pin holding the hair in place because the hairstyle barely moves. Harry expertly slides the bobby pin into Louis’ key ring, holding it open so that he can remove the car key, leaving the other keys on the ring, which he hands back to Louis. 

‘Thanks,’ he says gratefully, taking back the rest of his keys and turning to place them back in his coat pocket.

When he turns around, Harry is frowning and patting his quiff, a few strands now starting to come loose, probably because he is touching it. He looks up at Louis. ‘I can’t remember which part of my hair this pin was holding,’ he says forlornly. He looks so cute. Louis mentally kicks himself.

‘Harry, stop touching your hair, you’re just messing it up,’ he says, hoping to god his voice sounds like a normal person. A normal person who absolutely does not have a massive crush on his boss, yep. ‘Sit down, let me fix it.’

Harry obediently sits in the closest stool. ‘So do you have a secret hairdressing career as well?’ He quips, handing Louis the bobby pin.
‘Nope,’ Louis replies. ‘I just have a lot of sisters.’ Carefully, he picks up the strands of hair that had fallen out of the quiff and rearranges them, pinning them back into place and crossing the pin over the other one already there for good measure. ‘It’s not pulling your hair?’ He checks.

‘Nope,’ said Harry, turning around and smiling as he hopped off the chair. ‘Thank you.’

‘No problem,’ Louis says weakly.

Harry walks over to one of the drawers in the kitchen, extricating a keyring. ‘I’ve got my spare key, and the other one’s with my car key. So just let yourself in if you like tomorrow.’ He pauses, considering. ‘The plan for tomorrow is basically up to you. If you want time off in the morning just bring her round whenever and wake me if I’m not up, cause I don’t have to leave for work until about eleven tomorrow. Otherwise if it suits you better, or if you just want more hours, you can just keep her with you.’

Louis nods. ‘I’ll let you know.’

Harry pulls on his coat and picks up his bag, and his jar of salad. He hesitates, pausing. ‘I wish she was awake, so I can say goodbye,’ he says, looking up at Louis. ‘This will be the longest we’ve been apart.’

‘You’ll be fine Harry,’ he says encouragingly. ‘And she’ll be fine. I’ll send you pictures. Now get to work!’

Harry nods, a small grateful smile playing on his lips. ‘Thanks,’ he says quietly, as he leaves the flat.

Louis is packing Ariel’s bottles and formula when his phone rings not twenty minutes later. It’s Harry. ‘Hi!’ He answers. ‘Miss her already? She’s still sleeping, but I’ll send you photos later, I promise.’

‘I - yeah, I miss her,’ Harry sounds a little thrown, his voice unsure sounding through the phone. ‘But,’ he continues, his voice firmer now, regaining confidence. ‘That’s not why I called. I called to remind you to take the bassinet with you.’

‘Oh!’ Louis replies, feeling a little triumphant, because, about ten minutes after Harry had left, Louis’ brain had come back from wherever it fucked off to when he was within Harry’s presence. Once he had been able to yet again think clearly, he’d finally remembered that he did, in fact, own a cot. ‘No, it’s okay, I have a cot at home for when my siblings stay.’

‘Louis, there’s a porta-cot in the backseat of your car so unless you have more than one?’ Harry’s voice trails off, questioningly, and Louis wishes - for the sake of his pride, and also not looking like an idiot in front of Harry - that he did have more than one, but alas, he did not. His mum had insisted the twins would be fine to sleep together in the large cot when they stayed at his place, and he trusted her judgement. Also, what the fuck was it doing in his car anyway? He had no recollection of putting it there. 

‘Uh, no. Just the one. Sorry, I-’

‘Lou-ee,’ Harry says, cutting him off and drawing out his name impossibly slowly. Louis’ breath involuntarily hitches a little at how it sounds. Harry’s voice is like melted honey pouring into his ears and drowning his brain. ‘It’s fine, don’t worry, I just wanted to let you know. She’s still small enough for the bassinet, just take that. Anyway I’m heading into the studio now, I’ve gotta go. Have a good day, okay?’

‘Okay,’ replies Louis quietly. ‘You too Harry.’

Chapter Text

Louis finally figures out, in order to carry a bassinet, plus a baby, down to the underground car park, it is easier to put the baby in the bassinet first. This takes him an embarrassingly long time to figure out and he is never, ever, telling a soul. Finally, with the nappy bag (which is actually a cute little backpack, better looking and infinitely more practical than the standard design) on his back and the bassinet containing Ariel carefully cradled in his arms, he leaves the flat.

Harry’s car, while not brand new, is immaculately clean and smells of something pleasant and sweet. Louis cringes at the thought of Harry driving Louis’ own car. He didn’t think it was too bad at the moment but it was certainly not as clean as Harry’s. 
Ariel doesn’t seem to mind riding in the car, which Louis is immensely thankful for. One time he’d been driving the twins and they’d screamed the whole way, an experience he’d rather not repeat.

Once Louis gets to his place, he has a very pleasant afternoon with Ariel. Being in his own flat he has a chance to do some things around the house while she’s happy by herself, but he finds himself abandoning chores halfway through to come back and cuddle her. Whatever. Ariel deserves the attention and he’s kind of terrible at housework anyway. Louis keeps his word and sends Harry photos, to which he replies enthusiastically to with thanks and emojis. 

When it nears late afternoon Louis contemplates if he should try to bathe Ariel or not - babies didn’t technically have to be bathed every day unless they got physically dirty. And it’s a pain to bathe babies that can't sit up yet. He’d bathed her yesterday, at Harry’s, but Harry has an infant baby bath which makes the process infinitely easier - Louis doesn’t have one of those. 

In the end, Louis decides to suck it up and give her a bath anyway. It’s slightly stressful, and by the end of it, his entire body aches from the combination of kneeling on the cold tile of his bathroom, leaning over the edge of his bathtub, and holding Ariel securely in the water. To add to his stress, his phone intermittently beeps a few times while he bathes her and even rings once, but of course there’s no way he can answer it. Once he has Ariel safely out of the bath and wrapped in a soft towel, he picks up his phone. There are a couple of text messages from his friend Niall, which he ignores for now, and a missed call and a text from Harry. The text ‘everything ok?’ had come through several minutes after he had missed Harry’s call. Immediately, he calls Harry back.

‘Hey,’ Harry says as he answers, drawing out the word. God, his voice is gorgeous.

‘Erm, hi Harry,’ he replies, stumbling over his words. ‘Sorry I didn’t answer, I was giving her a bath.’

‘Oh! That’s perfectly okay, I thought it would be something like that. Sorry for like, the paranoid follow up text,’ Harry says, chuckling lightly.

‘It’s all good,’ Louis assures him. ‘Were you just calling to check in, or-?’ He dries Ariel as he talks to Harry, the phone on speaker.

‘Oh, right! Erm, I actually have a little time before my gig tonight - I was wondering if I could come see her?’

Louis immediately panics at the idea of Harry seeing his flat. It’s not a complete dump by any means, but Harry’s is always so pristine. Well, the two times he’s seen it anyway. ‘Sure,’ he replies, trying to sound casual and not panicky at all. He’s not sure he succeeds.

‘Great! I’ll be over within the half hour, depending on traffic,’ he replies cheerily.

God, Louis hopes there is traffic.

Five minutes later Louis has Ariel dressed in her sleepwear in record time, and she seems to be content to lie on the clean fluffy rug Louis had intermittently put her down on earlier in day as he halfheartedly attempted to do housework. Now, his attempt is not half-hearted. He races around, washing a few abandoned dishes, sweeping the kitchen floor, and generally trying to get rid of clutter. Louis has a habit of placing things down randomly where they don’t belong.

Twenty minutes after he called Harry, his doorbell rings. Louis quickly goes to pick Ariel up, thinking if he is holding her this will make a better impression for Harry when he answers the door. As he walks over to answer it, he belatedly realises that he still has random half-dried wet patches on his clothes from when he had lifted a dripping Ariel out of the bath. It’s too late to do anything about it now though.

He opens the door to a smiling Harry. ‘Come in,’ he says, stepping back and gesturing inside.

Harry steps inside, closing the door behind him and immediately reaching out with grabby hands for his daughter. ‘I can’t stay long,’ he says remorsefully, as Louis moves closer to Harry to transfer the baby to Harry, which can be a little tricky especially with babies like Ariel who are too young to hold their heads up yet. He ends up standing next to Harry, his shoulder bumping Harry’s upper arm. He carefully lifts Ariel off his own shoulder to transfer her to Harry’s, but it is awkward because Harry is bloody tall and to top it off he’s wearing heeled boots again, black today. Luckily, Harry realises the trouble and bobs down so that Louis can more easily place the baby on the other man’s shoulder.

‘Thanks,’ he says, as Harry takes hold of the baby.

‘No problem,’ Harry replies, adjusting his hold. His hands are so large that he can easily hold her away from his body so he can see her face, an angle Louis has tried but finds fiddly because Ariel tends to squirm too much. But she’s not squirming now, gazing up at her father contentedly as he literally holds her in his hands. ‘I missed you,’ Harry coos, talking to the baby. He effortlessly brings her up closer to his face and kisses her forehead, before settling her back against his shoulder. ‘How’s she been?’ He asks, making eye contact with Louis.

‘Really good,’ he replies, getting lost in Harry’s eyes for a second before quickly looking away. 

‘I’m glad,’ says Harry. ‘Since she’ll probably be a terror for you tonight.’

Louis risks a look back at Harry, thinking it probably looks pretty impolite to deliberately not look at someone when they’re trying to have a conversation with you. But Harry’s eyes are darting across Louis’ body, and gleaming in amusement.
‘Did she get you a bit wet then?’ He says, smiling, his eyes meeting Louis’ again.

‘Yeah,’ Louis shrugs. ‘I haven’t had time to change yet.’

‘Go change now, while I have her,’ he says, tilting his head forward to snuggle Ariel as he looks up at Louis.

‘Thanks,’ he replies gratefully, as he heads off to change, maintaining eye contact with Harry for just a beat too long before turning away. Jesus christ, what the fuck is wrong with him. First, he didn’t want the eye contact with Harry, now he can’t look away. As he walks to his room, he remembers the missed text messages from Niall. He quickly gets his phone out, scanning them quickly. Niall wants to come round and hang out with Louis, which normally Louis would be quite amenable to, especially today, god, he really needs to talk to someone about this whole Harry thing. It really was getting quite confusing inside his own head. But, he thinks, as he selects a new outfit, Harry might not be okay with him having a friend over while he looks after Ariel. He quickly texts Niall back after he finishes dressing, saying he’s not sure and will text him back soon. 

Before he leaves the room, he catches sight of himself in the mirror, suddenly realising what a disaster his hair is. This morning, it had been nicely slicked back from his face, with the top part styled into a quiff. Now, however, his hair is a sad sight, one section having gotten wet somehow and the quiff deflated. And even though Harry has already seen his hair, he just can’t bring himself to go back out there without at least trying to fix it. He hurries to the bathroom and quickly brushes some of the product out of his hair, then grabs his blow-dryer and dries the wet bit, directing the flow of the air downwards and a little to the side, drying his hair into a side swept fringe. It only takes a couple of minutes and he feels infinitely more put together.

When he emerges from the bathroom, he spies Harry sitting comfortably on Louis’ couch with his legs together, Ariel cradled lengthwise on his lap. Her head rests on Harry’s lower thighs, just shy of the bend of his knees. He looks up and smiles at Louis, and Louis knows it’s a dramatic thought but he thinks he might just die on the spot. This man is just too charming for his own good.

‘Your place is nice,’ Harry says, as Louis sits next to him. He sounds genuine, but Louis doesn’t know Harry well enough yet to know if he actually is, or just being polite.

‘Thank you,’ he replies quietly, looking down.

‘Louis,’ says Harry, and Louis does look up at him then. ‘I - now, please tell me if I am overstepping here, but I want to get to know you better, I want us to be friends, but I don’t want us to get off on the wrong foot. You seem shy, sometimes, when we’re talking, like I make you uncomfortable. I - I don’t want to do that,’ he finishes, looking at Louis fiercely.

Louis had felt his cheeks heating up the entire time Harry had been speaking, and immediately puts his head in his hands. Had he been that obvious? Evidently he had.

‘It’s okay Louis,’ Harry continues. ‘You don’t have to worry about it. Just - tell me what I’m doing wrong? I want you to be comfortable.’

Louis sighs into his hands. Why did Harry have to be so observant? Also, why did he have to be such a good person? Loads of people wouldn’t have given a fuck if they noticed the kind of behaviour Harry had been describing. He removes his hands from his face and looks up at Harry, seeing concern etched in the other man's features.

‘I find you - a little intimidating, sometimes,’ Louis says quickly, his cheeks flushing again.

Harry just stares at him, looking very confused. ‘What? How am I intimidating?’

Louis decides to just go for it and tell the truth as much as possible without actually confessing everything. ‘Like, you have these ridiculously cool outfits and you know how to make salad that actually tastes good and your flat is always clean even though you have a newborn.’

Harry shakes his head and closes his eyes. ‘Louis, I tried to tell you last night - that’s not me. I understand that’s what you’re seeing, but that’s not the full picture. And that’s partly my fault, I haven’t let you see the full picture yet. But god Louis I literally cried in front of you last night and you saw me in my pyjamas this morning. You’ve seen I’m a real human, yeah?’

Louis nods, a lump in his throat. The memory of seeing Harry like that seems to intensify his feelings. He just feels an overwhelming urge to protect Harry.

‘I guess,’ he begins hesitantly. ‘That because I have begun to see those sides of you, I want to do my job well so I can help you, but I don’t have much self-confidence, so I guess then I feel inadequate around you.’ This, at least, was true.

Harry looks thoughtful. ‘This is starting to make more sense,’ He says. ‘Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do Louis. I want us to be a team, and I can already see from your actions and suggestions that that’s what you want too. Now, I know words cannot magically fix self-esteem issues, but I want you to hear this anyway - the difference you have made in my life in the last two days is just astounding. Knowing that I can rely on you, and trust you, is just like a weight off my shoulders. And it’s helping me so much, like, mentally, you have no idea. And I hope you find me less intimidating as we get to know each other Louis, because, between the two of us I think we might just be able to raise the fuck out of this baby.’

And Louis - Louis isn’t quite sure how to respond to Harry’s little speech. His heart is brimming with the praise, and he also has more questions. Always so many questions. So he simply says ‘I agree, though we might have to cut down on the swearing when she’s older.’

And Harry laughs, honest to god laughs the loudest and longest Louis has seen yet, and it makes Louis so happy to see. When he calms down, he looks so relaxed, at first, but then he is looking at Louis intently, his eyes flickering over his face, and frowning.

‘Harry?’ Louis asks hesitantly

‘Sorry,’ he says, his voice pained. ‘I think my brain is doing a fucked up thing.’

‘What do you mean?’ Louis asks, worriedly.

‘Sorry, this is going to sound super weird, but - did we ever meet, before yesterday?’ He looks embarrassed, and a little scared, and he’s started chewing on the fingernails of the hand that’s not supporting Ariel, something Louis never seen him do before.

‘No Harry, we haven’t,’ Louis says gently. ‘Harry, are you okay?’

Harry sighs, and holds out Ariel to him. ‘Can you take her for a sec?’ Louis nods, and accepts the baby as Harry gently places her into his arms. Harry sits back and sighs, rubbing the crease between his eyebrows. ‘I just - I thought you were someone else for a second. Someone I’d met before. Your hair’s different, it just reminded me of him. Sorry.’

Louis doesn’t know quite what to say to that, and Harry speaks again before he can come up with anything.

‘I should get going,’ he says, and leans over Louis’ lap to kiss Ariel on the forehead. As he stands up to go, Louis belatedly remembers Niall. He stands up as well, shifting Ariel to his shoulder. 

‘Hey,’ he says hesitantly, ‘before you go, I was wondering how you felt about, erm, like me having friends over here, when I have Ariel? I mean it’s totally okay if not, I just thought I’d ask, because my friend Niall, he wanted to come round tonight and, yeah.’ He trails off lamely.

Harry smiles at him. ‘Louis,’ he says, ‘I trust you, and I know you will make sure Ariel is the priority. And I’m already worried you won’t get to see your friends as much now you’re working weekends. So yes, that’s fine.’

Louis brightens. ‘Thank you.’

Harry’s smile turns mischievous. ‘I wouldn’t recommend having anyone stay the night though, unless you’re trying to get rid of them. They will get a terrible sleep.’

And here’s the thing. Louis knows Harry is deliberately messing with him. But he just can’t seem to react how he normally would if it was Niall or one of his other mates saying something similar. Because it’s Harry and Louis is apparently incapable of acting normal around him. His body betrays him, and he feels his neck flushing, his face feels hot, and he’s stammering out ‘No, it’s not - it’s not like that, Niall’s just a mate, it’s…’ and then he just gives up on speech entirely, because he’s already made himself look like an idiot, and he should just quit while he’s ahead.

Harry looks like he is trying very, very hard not to laugh, his hand is over his mouth and he lets out a sound that sounds like a cross between a cough and like he’s choking, and his eyes are wet with tears. He lowers his hand once he has apparently somewhat composed himself.

‘I’m so sorry Lou, that was mean of me, and inappropriate. I just couldn’t seem to help myself.’ He is still smiling, but at least does seem to look apologetic. And Louis’ brain isn’t working again. The new nickname Harry just called him is playing on an infinite loop in his head.

‘It’s okay,’ he manages to get out. ‘I knew you were messing with me, I just - stupid shit sometimes comes out of my mouth when I’m with you. You make me nervous.’

Harry has the decency to look a little sheepish, but is also looking at Louis curiously, and Louis hopes to god he hasn’t figured out the exact reason for Louis’ nerves around him. ‘I know, and I knew you’d probably react the way you did, but apparently stupid shit tends to come out of my mouth too, cause I said it anyway.’ He pauses, clapping his hand on Louis' shoulder (the one that Ariel wasn’t snuggled into) and looks him squarely in the eye. ‘I have faith in us, Louis. We will get to the banter stage. Gonna be the dream team, you and me. You’ll see.’

And then Harry Styles walks out of Louis’ flat, and Louis is left reeling, clutching Harry’s daughter in his arms, and questions, always so many questions when it comes to Harry, swirling through his mind with no answers.

Chapter Text

‘Whose baby is that?’ Niall asks as he pushes past Louis into Louis’ flat, a six-pack of beer under his arm.

‘Hello to you too, Niall’ says Louis, closing the front door behind him. Ariel is snuggled into his shoulder, as per usual. It seems to be her permanent position. ‘It’s Harry Styles’ baby.’

‘Ha ha, very funny,’ He’s looking down, so only the top of his dyed blonde mop of hair is visible as he rummages around in Louis’ drawer, presumably for a bottle opener. ‘Who’s baby is it, really?’

Louis comes round to sit at the kitchen counter opposite Niall. ‘Niall, I’m not joking, this is actually Harry Styles’ baby.’

Niall finally finds a bottle opener and the cap pings off, clattering against the kitchen counter. He stares at Louis. ‘Harry Styles, as in, that new singer Nick Grimshaw’s obsessed with?’

‘Yep, that one.’

‘So why do you have his baby?’ Niall asks, taking a sip of his beer. His blue eyes widen. ‘Wait - is he here?’

‘Nah, not anymore. He left to go do his gig. I have his baby because I work for him.’

Niall looks confused. ‘I thought you worked at the daycare? Or are you still working there and just doing this at night?’

‘Nah, the daycare’s closed. A car crashed into it. I work for Harry full time now.’

Niall suddenly looks very suspicious, frowning at Louis. ‘Tommo, is anything you’ve said in the last five minutes the least bit true?’

After he shows Niall the news article about the daycare and a stupid video Harry had sent him of him blowing kisses and waving to the camera (with strict instructions to show to Ariel), Niall finally believes him. That job done, Louis puts Ariel down on her rug and goes to the kitchen to prepare a bottle for her.

‘I’m confused,’ says Niall, who is still standing at the kitchen counter. ‘That baby’s really small Louis. Shouldn’t its mother be looking after it?’

‘It’s a she, Niall, and as far as I know her mother isn’t in the picture,’ he says as he scoops formula into the bottle, topping it with cooling water from the kettle he’d boiled earlier. ‘Harry said he’s a single dad with no support from family.’

‘Well, that’s super weird,’ says Niall, sipping his beer. ‘That kid was literally inside a woman what, like a month, two months ago?

‘Five weeks,’ says Louis quietly, capping the bottle and shaking it.

‘Exactly Louis, it’s super weird. Have you asked Harry about it?’

Louis tests the formula on the inside of his arm. It feels a tiny bit hot, so he turns to put the bottle in the freezer. ‘No,’ he says, closing the freezer door and coming to stand back next to Niall at the bench.

‘Why not?’ Niall asks, looking exasperated. ‘Aren’t you insanely curious?’
‘I am,’ says Louis slowly. ‘But I also agree with you that the situation is highly unusual. That means that, most likely, the mother is unable to care for her child, or doesn’t want to, and to get to that stage, something pretty shitty must have happened. That’s why I want to let Harry talk about it when he’s ready.’

Niall looks thoughtful. ‘You know what Louis; you are a really fucking considerate person. If it was me, I probably would have just run my mouth without even thinking about it.’

Louis gives him a genuine smile to let Niall know he did actually appreciate his sincerity, before stepping out from behind the kitchen counter. Ariel had started to fuss, probably getting hungry or wanting to be held. ‘My god Niall,’ he says loudly, as he walks to the living room. ‘Did I just hear a compliment come out of your mouth? I thought you were allergic to giving others their due praise.’ This couldn’t be more untrue, especially when it comes to Louis. Niall constantly tries to bring him up, especially when Louis gets so inside his own head. Sometimes, the almost ever-present voice saying he’s not good enough gets louder and louder until it’s unbearable. But now isn’t one of those times, he’s feeling pretty good actually, all things considered, and he loves the banter.

‘Oh no Tommo,’ Niall says. Louis turns back to head toward the kitchen, having picked up Ariel. Niall has a comical grin on his face, and the sarcasm in his voice is thick as he continues. ‘I’m not allergic to givin’ out compliments. It’s just so hard to think of anything you’re remotely good at, most of the time.’

Louis bursts out laughing. He tries to subside it, so he doesn’t jostle Ariel too much, but it’s near impossible to do. As a result, once he’s calm, the baby is squirming in his arms, making little distressed sounds. ‘Sorry darlin’,’ he says soothingly, patting her head and readjusting her so she feels safe. He half-heartedly glares at Niall, mostly to be dramatic. ‘Next time you want to make me almost fall over laughing, can you do it when I don’t have a baby in my arms, please and thank you?’

Niall laughs. ‘Honestly didn’t think I was that much of a comedian.’ He motions to the fridge. ‘You want her bottle?’

‘Please,’ says Louis. He can hold Ariel one handed, of course, but he doesn’t find it nearly as effortless as Harry seems to. If Niall is happy to help, Louis will take it. 

They make their way over to the couch, Niall looking kind of hilarious with a beer in one hand and a baby bottle in the other. Louis sits down and nestles Ariel in the crook of his arm so he can feed her, taking the bottle from Niall and testing the temperature again before he starts feeding her. Niall’s a great mate really, he can talk to him about almost anything, and they get on so well.  They’d met a few years ago, Niall needed a flat mate and Louis wanted to move to London. The rent was cheap, well, cheap for London, and Niall hadn’t appeared to be a murderer. So, Louis had taken a chance and moved in with a complete stranger. Thankfully, they had clicked basically straight away and had been best mates ever since.

‘D’you think I can meet Harry?’ Niall asks as he sits down.

Louis considers this. ‘Why d’you wanna meet him? You’re not gonna be all stupid and fanboy over him are you?’

Niall pointedly looks everywhere except for Louis' face.

‘Oh my god,’ Louis laughs, keeping an eye on Ariel to make sure she’s feeding okay. ‘You actually are!’

‘Louis, he’s literally living my dream!’ Niall half-shouts, exasperated.

‘I thought you weren’t pursuing music anymore?’

‘Louis, you don’t understand,’ says Niall, sighing. ‘I know you gave up on it a while ago, but for me - I just can’t do that. It’s always in the back of my mind. It’s always something I wish I could be doing.’

‘I wouldn’t say I gave up,’ Louis bristles. ‘I’m just realistic. And I still write songs.’

‘Which you don’t do anything with except give them to me, which I really do appreciate by the way, but you do realise you could actually be selling them? Louis, your songs are good enough to be on radio.’

Louis wants to laugh, but he’s pretty sure Ariel is very relaxed and might even be on the verge of falling asleep, so he controls himself. Instead, he just scoffs at Niall. ‘Fuck off. That’s not true.’

‘Oh?’ Replies Niall. ‘So you’re just giving me crap songs you don’t think are actually good? Do they sound terrible when I sing them?’

Louis is confused. ‘No, of course not. They sound amazing when you sing them.’

‘Then it should stand to reason that they might sound amazing when someone else sings them. Someone famous, someone who’s willing to pay for a good song.’

And the thing is, Louis gets what Niall is saying, logically, Niall is making sense. But Louis can’t get past that little voice in his head saying not good enough, not good enough. And he’d thought he was feeling okay but now it all suddenly seems too much, just another thing piling on top of everything else on his mind. He looks down to see Ariel has nearly finished her bottle and is falling asleep. He stops feeding her and hands the bottle to Niall, lifting her up to his shoulder to burp her before she falls asleep completely. ‘Niall,’ he says gently. ‘I know you are just trying to help. But my inferiority complex is not something I can handle talking about right now. I have another, erm, issue, that’s more pressing I need to talk to you about.’

Niall looks conflicted, like he’s trying to figure out if he should make a joke or just be serious for a second. Louis doesn’t particularly care what he decides on, he just closes his eyes briefly and continues rubbing Ariel’s back.

‘Okay, Louis, but we are definitely rain checking this discussion, okay? And I’m meeting Harry Styles.’

‘Okay Niall,’ he says, still with his eyes closed. ‘I’ll try. For both.’ He opens his eyes. Niall is looking at him concernedly. ‘Are you staying here tonight?’ Louis continues.

‘Is she gonna wake up, and cry?’ Niall asks, raising his eyebrows at Ariel.

‘Yes.’

‘Then no.’

‘Cool, now that’s settled, can you put the bassinet in the spare room for me please? It’s just there next to you.’

‘Whatever would you do without me,’ says Niall merrily as he carries it into the spare room.

‘I would carry her with one hand,’ Louis says, deadpan. ‘But I don’t feel like doing that, since you’re perfectly capable of helping me.’

‘That is absolutely fair enough,’ Niall says, flopping down on one of the twin single beds in the room. Louis puts Ariel to bed, motioning for Niall to be quiet, then goes back for the baby monitor, turning it on and plugging it in. By this time, Niall has migrated back out to the couch and opened a second beer, so Louis turns the spare room light off and closes the door, leaving Ariel to sleep.

He heads to the fridge and gets a beer for himself, feeling comfortable with having one now Ariel is asleep. From what Harry has told him she normally sleeps for a good long while after she’s first put down and then wakes up at least twice after midnight. He opens the beer and sits next to Niall on the couch, putting his beer down on the coffee table and pulling his knees up to his chest and staring at the wall. He doesn’t know where to start, is the thing. Doesn’t know how to explain this whole thing to Niall. So much has happened in the last couple of days, but he thinks he just wants to tell Niall about his crush on Harry for now. His whole therapy revelation is complicated and Niall doesn’t even know the specifics of what happened six months ago.

‘Louis?’ Asks Niall. ‘You said you wanted to talk about something?’ He looks worried, and Louis feels instantly terrible for having worried him. He just spits it out.

‘I have a crush on Harry Styles.’

Niall looks confused for a second, then starts laughing. ‘Oh my god Louis, what the fuck? I thought it was something serious.’

Louis sighs and takes the first sip of his beer. ‘It is serious Niall. I can barely function around the man. I think he thinks I have social anxiety or something.’

Niall continues laughing. ‘Louis, you do not have social anxiety.’

‘I know I don’t!’ Says Louis, exasperated, and it’s true. He does get anxious, definitely, when his thoughts spin out of control, or when he overthinks things. But mostly, it’s a general hum, a constant tiny ball of anxiety that sits under everything else, right next to the twin ball of sadness in the very centre of his being. He takes a breath, shaking himself slightly, not wanting to delve too much into that particularly depressing line of thought right this second. He wrenches his thoughts back on track to discussion at hand. It’s true, he thinks, as he takes another sip from his beer. He’s thankfully never really had a problem with anxiety in social situations. In fact, he often feeds off the company, and the attention. He can’t really recall ever having as much difficulty interacting normally with another person as he does with Harry Styles. ‘That’s only part of the issue,’ Louis continues, eager to get all his thoughts out. ‘The main issue is that there is no way this will end well.’

‘How do you know that?’ Niall says calmly.

‘I just do Niall, it’s me, okay?’ Louis says pleadingly.

‘Okay Louis, cut with that crap for a second. What are the actual barriers standing between you and dating Harry Styles? As far as I can see you’ve already got a way better chance than the average fan.’

‘Well, for one, I don’t even know if he likes men.’

Niall looks thoughtful. ‘True, that could be an issue. But you don’t know that yet, do you? So it’s not a definite barrier right now. Anything else?’

Louis sips his beer. ‘Well, I have no idea what’s going on with Ariel’s mum. What if they’re still together?’

‘I highly doubt that, since you said he said he had no family support yeah? And that he said he was a single dad. But I’ve no doubt that whatever the situation is, it’ll be complicated. So you probably do need to try and find out a bit more about that first before diving into a relationship with him. You should know what you’re getting into.’

Louis nods. ‘That’s actually a good point Niall, maybe if I find out he has too much family drama this stupid crush might go away and everything will go back to normal.’ Louis seriously doubts the crush will go away any time soon, regardless of the situation, but one could dream.

‘Maybe,’ Niall replies. ‘Anything else you see standing in your way?’

‘The fact that he’s my boss,’ Louis groans. ‘It just feels - inappropriate. Unprofessional. Like okay, say the thing with Ariel’s mum’s not an issue, and he’s into guys, and he’s into me - I still don’t know if I would be comfortable getting with him if I’m working for him.’

Now it’s Niall’s turn to groan. ‘Louis, if it gets to that stage, then you just quit.’

Louis blinks. ‘But what about, like - I can’t just leave him in the lurch like that. And then I won’t have a job.’

Niall throws his hands in the air. ‘Honestly, Louis, it’s like you don’t want this to work. You can find him a new nanny, and while you do that you can find yourself a new job. Also, surely you can go back to your job at the daycare when it reopens, yeah?’

Louis fiddles with the label on his beer bottle. ‘Yeah, but it depends when that is.’

‘I know Louis, but it’s still something, right? Look, I think for now you should use the opportunity while you’re working for him to try to get to know him better. And then hopefully, you’ll figure out a bit better where you stand and where you want to go with this whole thing.’

Louis nods. ‘Thanks for helping me talk through all that - I think I was going a bit crazy in my own head there.’

‘No problem, Tommo,’ says Niall, draining his beer. ‘It was highly entertaining. And I’m going to meet Harry Styles.’

‘I didn’t actually promise you that!’ Louis calls as Niall goes to the fridge to get himself another beer.

‘Whatever, it’s happening, I’ve decided.’ Niall says as he sits back down, pulling out his phone. ‘I’m going to google him, see if we might be able to find the answers to some of your questions.’

‘I doubt you’ll find anything,’ Louis replies. ‘He hasn’t done any interviews or anything yet, he had to wait until he got childcare sorted before scheduling them.’

‘You’re right,’ says Niall, frowning at his phone. ‘Oh wait! I found a video. From an X-Factor audition years ago.’

Louis’ fingers tighten on the neck of his nearly empty beer bottle. ‘What?’ He asks sharply, moving over to sit right next to Niall so he could see his phone. ‘Show me.’

Niall presses play on the video and Louis’ mouth goes dry. He doesn’t even wait until the boy in the video - Harry - starts singing, he just pulls his phone out and dials Harry’s number.

Chapter Text

‘What’re you-’ begins Niall, but Louis shushes him, getting up from the couch. He walks over to the kitchen. He knows it’s unlikely that Harry will pick up, but he wants to try. When the answer phone kicks in, he doesn’t bother to leave a message but just hangs up, instead tapping out a few text messages to Harry in quick succession.

You’re not going crazy we have met before

I’m so sorry I didn’t realise sooner you just look so different from back then and we literally only talked for a few minutes

It was at the X-Factor auditions in 2010

Louis’ thumb hovers over the keyboard, wondering if he should add anything else but he decides that’s enough. He looks up to see Niall standing at the kitchen counter, staring at him with a half exasperated, half concerned expression on his face.

‘Louis, you’re being weird.’

‘Sorry, I - look, Harry asked me earlier today if we had met before and I said no, but we have Niall, I didn’t realise until you showed me that video, he looks so different now.’

Niall stares at Louis incredulously. ‘So, what, you met Harry in like, when was that, 2011, 2010? Where?’

Louis takes a deep breath. He doesn’t think Niall will be annoyed, exactly, that Louis hasn’t told him this, but he might be - hurt? Louis isn’t sure. ‘I met him that day, when I auditioned for X-Factor.’

Niall stares at him, looking confused. ‘You never told me you auditioned for X-Factor.’

‘God, Niall it’s so embarrassing, I never even made it past the first audition. It’s not something I’m thrilled to bring up.’

‘But we talked about X-Factor so much Louis, when I auditioned just after you moved in. What, did you think I would judge you?’

Louis throws up his hands. ‘I don’t know, Niall, I’d just met you!’

‘Okay, okay,’ says Niall placatingly. ‘So what happened, when you met him back at X-Factor?’

Louis’ brain has been struggling to remember exactly what had happened. To be fair, the interaction had lasted less than five minutes and was almost six years ago. ‘Nothing, really, we just met in the loos. But at least now I’ve let him know I remember it too, so he doesn’t think he’s a crazy person.’

‘Very considerate of you,’ Niall deadpans.

‘Wait!’ Louis says, a key factor from the meeting suddenly coming to the forefront of his mind. ‘Niall, I don’t think he’s straight.’

Niall raises his eyebrows. ‘Really?’

Louis nods emphatically. ‘He asked for my number. Back then.’

‘Did you give it to him?’

‘Yep,’ Louis nods, the events of the day coming back to him now. ‘I think I – jokingly asked for his autograph? Yeah, that was it. And he signed a paper towel for me. But then I think he said something like, only if I can have your number in return. So I wrote it on the paper towel and ripped it in half and never saw him again. Until, like, yesterday.’

Niall is frowning a little. ‘So he asked for your number but never called you? Or texted you?’

Louis shrugs. ‘Well yeah. But that’s not that unexpected.’

‘It’s a bit rude.’ Niall countered.

‘He probably just changed his mind Niall, it happens all the time. I’ve gotten countless numbers when I’ve been out drinking and never called most of them.’

‘That is a very different thing Louis and you know it. You and Harry were not blind drunk in a pub. Anyway, hopefully he just, like, lost the paper or something, or there’s another explanation, I don’t know. I’m just trying to look out for you Lou. Some of the people you’ve been with seemed like awesome guys at first but then turned out to be absolute dicks. I guess I’m just not keen for a repeat of that.’

Louis sighs. He is well aware of this. He seems to have the absolute worst luck with dating and relationships. ‘I know Niall. I’m not keen for a repeat of that either. And I really don’t know Harry at all. I think I’ll take your advice and take the opportunity to get to know him better before I dive into anything.’

Niall smiles. ‘Good to hear it mate.’

With nothing else to discuss really on the topic of Harry Styles – for now – Niall turns his attention to his stomach and rants good naturedly about the lack of food available for him to eat then quietens while he presumably orders some kind of takeaway on his phone. While he does this, Louis retreats to the couch and hugs a cushion to himself for comfort. He hadn’t noticed he was hungry until Niall mentioned food.

‘Dude are you okay?’

Louis starts a little as Niall sinks down onto the couch next to him. He had been daydreaming about Harry’s perfect face and how he wasn’t straight and all of the possibilities that meant. He’s also still simultaneously reeling a little from the fact that they’d actually met before, and conveniently trying to ignore the connotations of sadness that memory dug up from the past had attached to it.

‘What?’

‘You literally have nothing but alcohol and condiments in your kitchen, Louis.’

Louis sighs. Sometimes he wishes his friends were less observant, or didn’t care enough to notice or comment on these failings of his. Niall didn’t look judgemental though, more just concerned. He’s never really okay, but he knows what Niall means. Is he attempting to be kind to himself? Is he looking after himself? Can he function?

‘I’ve been eating at Harry’s,’ he attempts weakly.

‘You’ve had that job for literally two days Lou, and there was also no food when I came over last week. Or the week before.’

Louis knows this. Of course he does. But he just hadn’t been able to bring himself to care, the thought becoming too exhausting once he’d finished work for the day, and just doing without the things he needed to buy seemed easier. ‘I guess the last week or so was a bit rough,’ he admits. ‘I definitely slacked on the groceries. But I’m feeling a bit better now.’

‘Okay.’ Niall responds. ‘That’s good. It’s good you’re feeling a little better. I guess I just worry, you know? I’m sorry you’ve been having a rough few weeks,’ he pauses, looking uncertain. ‘You could have talked to me about it.’

Louis knows. He knows Niall will always listen. But he worries about overburdening Niall with too much, which he was almost positive he had done when they were living together. He might have talked to him if he’d an actual reason, like a trigger or something, that had sent the sadness seeping through his body as soon as his actual responsibilities for other people were done for the day. But he hadn’t been able to pinpoint anything specific, and that made it harder for him to communicate what he was feeling to Niall. Also, he hadn’t actually realised how bad it had been getting until he’d started feeling his mood lift the last day or so. He supposes it was his decision to go back to therapy, and maybe also the change in job?

He thinks about it. At the daycare, it was always busy, there were more babies, for one, and always something that had to be done, like cleaning or prepping the bottles and food. And it wasn’t like he had nothing to do when he was looking after Ariel – there still was a lot to do. But he had downtime. He could simply lie down next to her on her mat, and daydream or scroll through his phone or read if he was so inclined, he could lavish her in cuddles and just give her his undivided attention, she giving him comfort as well as return.

And, there was no one watching him work. Even though he wasn’t really caring for Ariel any differently than he did the babies at the centre, apart from giving her a bit more attention simply because he had the time, it felt more calming to work without someone watching over his shoulder, so to speak. Less pressure. So maybe it was the new job.

Regardless of the cause though, something had happened to pull him slightly out of his rut and he should take advantage while he could. He swore his stomach had practically cried in happiness as he ingested Harry’s salad today after weeks of sporadically grabbing whatever food the kids hadn’t eaten from the kitchen at work. His evening meals had been similarly haphazard, consisting of either takeaway, booze, or both.

‘I know,’ he says, finally responding to Niall after what has probably been too long of a pause while he was lost in his own thoughts. ‘Maybe I’ll do it tomorrow,’ he muses. ‘Take Ariel with me.’

‘So you can’t get groceries by yourself but you think you can do it with a baby?’ Niall asks, deadpan. ‘Louis, children turn into literal demons at the supermarket. I’ve seen it.’

Louis shrugs. ‘If she’s in a horrible mood I won’t go, obviously. But she was really good for me today. We’ll see.’

Niall leaves after they’ve eaten and played a bit of FIFA. It’s still early, and that’s fine by Louis. He wants to try and get a bit of sleep before Ariel inevitably wakes up. He’s slightly surprised, and endlessly grateful, to find himself feeling comfortably full and sleepy from the Chinese takeout Niall had ordered and his single beer. After a warm shower, he’s even more drowsy. His slightly-better-than-normal head space feels strange, but he hopes it sticks around. It’s like he’s grasped onto a thread at the end of a frayed rope, to try and pull himself out of this hole. The thread could easily break and he could fall, but at least he’s holding onto something.

He puts on a football podcast that he’s fairly sure he’ll be interested enough in to keep any anxious thoughts at bay but he shouldn’t get so invested in that he’ll want to stay awake listening. After making sure the baby monitor is working and setting a twenty minute timer on the podcast, he falls gratefully into bed. It’s been a long day, and while he normally has difficulty falling asleep, he’s feeling pretty drained and hopes he’ll fall asleep quickly. At first he tries to avoid thinking of Harry in case it starts to stress him out, but it’s not long before he’s no longer actually listening to the podcast, it’s just a litany of sound washing over him, and images of Harry’s pretty curls and his kind eyes dance across his tired brain. And it’s not stressing him out. It’s lulling him to sleep.

Louis wants to die, he wants to absolutely die. It feels like he’s only just gotten back to sleep and Ariel is screaming through the monitor for like, what is this, the third time? He stumbles into the spare bedroom, flicking on the lamp and picking her up to check on her. She doesn’t settle immediately when he picks her up. Her nappy is still dry from when he changed it before putting her back down only half an hour ago, and he fed her the time before that so she shouldn’t need another feed yet. He hugs her, patting her back to try to calm her down. After what seems like ages, she finally quietens down and he’s hoping against hope she’s fallen back asleep because Louis feels like he’s falling asleep on his feet himself. Gingerly, he lowers the sleeping baby into the bassinet, before tiptoeing gratefully back to his own room. He doesn’t even make it back to his own bed before she screams again.

Louis devises a plan. He can’t let her sleep in his arms because he can’t trust himself not to fall asleep, he’s too tired so it’s not safe. Instead, he pulls one of the single mattresses from his spare room clean off the bed frame and into the living room while Ariel screams in her bassinet. He picks her up to start soothing her while he goes round and makes sure all the curtains are shut, in the somewhat insane hope of keeping the room dark past sunrise should they manage to sleep past then. He places the bassinet strategically next to the mattress and when she’s finally asleep again in his arms, places her back into the bassinet, crawling gratefully straight under the covers of the mattress right beside her. This time, when he hears the first whimper, he reaches out and pats her tummy, and finds her hand, letting her grasp his finger. She stops whimpering when she realises he’s right there. After she’s been quiet for a while, her grip slackens on his finger, and he removes it, falling almost instantly asleep to the sounds of her soft breathing.

Louis is disorientated when he wakes up, for several reasons, but the one that slams into his brain almost instantly is that there is no crying. He sits up in absolute terror and almost cries in relief when he sees a wide-eyed Ariel staring up at him, lying contentedly in her bassinet. He picks her up and cuddles her, still sitting in bed tangled in the covers, his heart still hammering in his chest.

‘Baby don’t do that to me, oh god, I’d prefer you cry, fuck that scared the shit out of me. How long have you been awake, anyway?’ He glances around as he rambles, fully realising the other thing that had seemed off when he’d first awoken. It’s fucking daytime, light seeping in through the edges of the curtains. They’d - or at least he’d - slept in.

He’s so rattled he just sits there and hugs her for a few minutes, before feeling calm enough to get out of bed. He takes Ariel with him to go check his phone, hardly believing it when he sees it’s just after 7am in the morning. Surely she will be hungry soon. Deciding to get ahead of it, he fixes her a bottle after changing her slightly damp nappy. He’s slightly surprised to find he’d like some breakfast himself, but that’s not possible with the state of his fridge and pantry. He’s even run out of tea, which is just pathetic.

‘Come for breakfast with me,’ Louis whines to Niall on speakerphone as he hops around his room tugging on a sock.

‘Why?’

‘Cause I need someone to hold Ariel while I eat, I don’t have like, a pram or anything for her.’

‘Louis, that sounds entirely like a you problem, and not a me problem. I was going to go back to bed.’

‘I’ll make sure you get to meet Harry Styles,’ Louis says breathlessly as he finds his shoes. He’s still so astounded by his improved mood. It’s still miraculously present despite his horrendous night, and Ariel terrifying the shit out of him this morning. He is determined to go out for fucking breakfast, because with his luck he’ll probably be back to crying into a bottle of vodka on his nights off in no time.

‘Fine, okay okay but come pick me up.’ Niall groans, and hangs up the phone.

At breakfast, Louis feels - off. Despite his mood continuing the trend of being ever so slightly more positive than negative, he doesn’t feel like himself. He thinks it’s a combination of his sudden bizarre desire to consume eggs benedict at eight in the morning, sleep deprivation, and lingering anxiety from how he’d awoken that morning. He can’t really convey any of this to Niall though, apart from the sleep deprivation bit. He doubts Niall would understand his anxiety over Ariel this morning. As for his appetite, he is pretty sure Niall has no idea just how fucked up his relationship with food has been over the last six months or so, and he’s not about to start explaining it now. He doesn’t even fully understand it himself.

Niall’s mere presence is helping though, the social interaction warming and smoothing over the frazzled edges of his nerves. As agreed, they take turns alternating holding Ariel while the other eats. Louis lets Niall chatter on and take control of the conversation, simply enjoying the company of both Niall and Ariel.

Eventually, he starts to feel a little more comfortable in his own skin, and that’s when his brain digs up a few, faded memories of his extremely brief interaction with Harry six years ago. It keeps showing them to him, interspersed with images of present-day Harry, as if to say, look, that adorable little boy is all grown up. The thoughts are a nice little background to the presently occurring events, grocery shopping eventually after they are done with breakfast. Ariel does not, in fact, turn into a demon child in the supermarket as Niall predicted, and Louis is glad.

‘Look!’ Says Niall excitedly after they’ve gotten back to Louis’ and put the groceries away. ‘Look at the fucking fridge, I wanna take a picture!’

Louis rolls his eyes. ‘Take one if you want, but hurry up I need to drop you back home on the way to Harry’s.’

‘What do you mean, on the way?’ I thought I was going to meet him!’ Niall objects, looking at Louis with betrayal.

‘I never said today,’ Louis says calmly. ‘But I will organise it, I swear.’

Chapter Text

He gets back to Harry’s just after 10am, putting the bassinet containing Ariel down to unlock the door, not wanting to knock if Harry was still sleeping. He needn’t have worried though, as he spots Harry standing in the kitchen stirring something in a mug as the door swings open. Quickly, he bends down to lift Ariel out of the bassinet so that Harry could see her.

‘Oh my god,’ Harry says excitedly as he rushes over to meet them, taking Ariel from Louis’ arms. He’s wearing a pale blue jumper and matching track pants, his hair loose, not styled but brushed into soft waves.

‘Hey baby,’ he coos to Ariel. ‘Louis I slept so long, so so long it was amazing,’ he blabbers as he hugs Ariel tightly. ‘I only just woke up, I did reply to your text but I guess you were driving.’ Harry was walking over to the living room now as he was talking, bending down to put Ariel down on her mat.

Louis brings the bassinet inside and shuts the door, putting it down along with the nappy bag. He’s only just straightened up when he finds himself engulfed with an armful of Harry. Slightly shocked at the sudden contact, he freezes at first, before easing into the hug.

‘I lost your number,’ Harry says breathlessly. Louis frowns, confused. ‘I lost that stupid bit of paper, and I never saw you again, and I looked and looked for you at boot camp and you weren’t there and I -’ Harry pulls back from the hug, but still holding Louis’ shoulder, looking him in the eyes. ‘I’m so sorry Louis.’

Louis is confused, and not quite sure how to respond to this. ‘Um, it’s okay. Like I didn’t really expect you to text me anyway.’

Harry just stares at him, incredulous. ‘What the fuck? Why?’

Louis is starting to feel quite helpless. He doesn’t want to upset Harry, but he doesn’t quite know what else to say but the truth. ‘Because shit like that doesn’t happen to me. Pretty boys don’t text me.’

Harry just looks horrified now. ‘What kind of person would - like for fucks sake Louis I was so -’ he scrubs a hand over his eyes. ‘I am so not mentally stable enough for this conversation right now. I’m gonna shower. Sorry.’

And Louis is left standing in the living room, trying to piece together exactly what the fuck just happened.

While Harry’s showering, he reads the text he’d sent him on the way over.

Omg it is you I thought I was going crazy haha. So happy I found you!! We’ll talk when you get here okay

The text is followed with a litany of smiley face and heart emojis, and after reading it, Louis is even more confused than ever. He knows he’s upset Harry and that is the last fucking thing he wants to do. But what else was he supposed to say? He’s always been bad at this kind of thing and he’d honestly just said what felt right in the moment. But then he thinks over what he said, and realises his mistake. It might’ve sounded to Harry like he’d thought Harry was a bad person, like he just got his number to mess with him. Honestly, Louis would be upset too if someone thought that about him.

He sighs and picks up Ariel, going back over to the couch to sit with her cuddled against his chest. Basically, almost everything Harry had said in his text and their conversation is confusing the fuck out of him. Like Harry was letting him see tiny snippets of the full picture but he was also keeping so much back. Louis’ struggling to put the pieces together and figure out exactly what the fuck Harry’ trying to communicate to him. 

When Harry emerges from his shower Louis is lying next to Ariel on the floor, their heads next to each other as he pulls faces at her and taps the mobile above their heads, making it move. Louis tries to sit up quickly when he hears the heels of Harry’s boots clicking into the room and ends up getting half of his hair disarrayed by the offending mobile. He hastily tries to fix it as he looks up at Harry, who’s own hair is still wet and slicked up in a bun.

‘I’m sorry about before,’ he says quietly, green eyes piercing into Louis. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking, how I expected that to go.’

Louis licks his lips. ‘I’m sorry if - if I offended you, that’s not how I meant it, at all.’

‘I know, I figured that out once I thought about it for a second.’ He sighs. ‘Can you just tell me one thing, please, and then I’ll drop it?’

Louis isn’t quite sure he wants Harry to drop it, because from what he’s been able to piece together, that Harry back in 2010 had been sincere in asking for his number. He’d been genuinely upset when he lost it, had even looked for him at boot camp, which Louis obviously never attended. They hadn’t even exchanged names, just two scraps of paper towel from the bathroom they’d met in, one with Harry’s almost illegible autograph and one with Louis’ number Harry had cheekily asked for in return.

But that meant that Harry, at least back in 2010, had liked him. Harry had liked him, and had been ecstatic, at least in his text when he’d first found out, to have found him again. So no, Louis does not want him to drop this. 

‘Ask away. But then I have something to say too.’

Harry nods. ‘Okay. I just want to know, were you at least a little bit sad when I didn’t text you?’

‘Yes.’ Louis answers honestly. ‘Yes, I was.’

‘Okay,’ says Harry, nodding. ‘Okay.’ He looks at Louis expectantly, waiting for him to continue.

‘Don’t drop this on my account. If you want to for yourself, that’s fine, I understand that. But I don’t mind talking about it more.’ Louis’ heart is racing as he gets the words out, worried that he’s said too much. But he had to say it, would never forgive himself if he didn’t.

Harry is looking at him curiously and Louis squirms, hoping he didn’t just make this really fucking awkward.

‘I am so fucking late,’ Harry sighs, eyes still locked with Louis’. ‘But thank you for saying that, Louis. Noted.’ And with that, the eye contact is broken as he quickly walks to where Ariel is lying to give her a quick goodbye, then grabs his coat and walks out the door without another word.

Louis knocks lightly on Harry’s door the next morning. They hadn’t really talked much when Harry had gotten home last night, just about Ariel’s routine as they were both pretty tired and wanted to get to bed. Louis frowns when Harry doesn’t come to answer the door, but he simply fishes out the key Harry gave him and lets himself in.

The flat is quiet, and Louis wonders if they might be out. He goes over to Ariel’s room and peeks inside. The baby is in her cot, and he can see the rise and fall of her chest and hear her soft breaths as she sleeps peacefully. Satisfied she is safe, Louis quietly closes the door and heads to Harry’s room. He pauses in the already open doorway, initially thinking he is sleeping too, until he sees the covers shift and hears a muffled sob. Louis freezes, torn between respecting Harry’s privacy and wanting to make sure he’s okay. He decides to just go to the living room for now to reassess rather than staring creepily at Harry, but in his haste to get out of there he kicks his toe on the skirting board. It really fucking hurts, because he’d already taken his shoes off when he came in, and he can’t help but swear involuntarily.

‘Lou?’ Harry calls when he hears the noise. ‘Louis is that you?’

Louis pokes his head into the doorway. ‘Hi, yes it’s me. No intruders.’

Harry is sitting up in bed. His hair is in absolute disarray, and his eyes are red from crying. ‘What happened, why did you swear? Are you and Ariel okay?’

‘We’re fine, she’s still sleeping and I just swore ‘cause I stubbed my toe.’ Louis pauses, considering. ‘But you don’t look okay, Harry.’

‘I’m not,’ he says as he flops back down in bed. ‘Come here.’

Louis is not quite sure what Harry means by that, so he goes round to the opposite side of the bed that Harry is lying in and sits on the edge of the bed, body angled toward Harry.

‘Can you lie down?’ Harry asks quietly, staring up at the ceiling. ‘I feel like you’re judging me from all the way up there.’

‘No judgement here,’ Louis replies as he follows Harry’s instructions. He doesn’t have to make the decision whether to get under or lay on top of the covers because Harry is basically hogging them anyway, so he simply lays on his side on the sheeted mattress, head propped on the pillow and facing Harry. 

‘Thank you,’ says Harry, turning on his side also to face Louis but only making eye contact for a second before fixing his gaze at some seemingly random spot on the wall behind Louis. ‘I’m not going to work today.’ He continues.

‘Okay.’

‘But I still need you to stay and look after Ariel.’

‘That’s fine.’

They lie in silence for a bit, Louis giving Harry the space and freedom to talk or not talk as he feels comfortable. Maybe he just needs the comforting presence of another human, something Louis definitely understands. He decides to say something though, when a silent tear rolls down Harry’s face and Louis’ heart just about breaks. 

‘Harry, if you need to talk about anything, I’m a good listener. Or if not that, just let me know what you need.’

Harry scrunches his eyes shut and a few more tears leak out. He rolls back to stare at the ceiling and is silent for what seems like an eternity, but Louis doesn’t know exactly because he’s not going to be so insensitive as to check his phone in this moment. When Harry finally does speak, Louis is absolutely not prepared for the words that come out of his mouth.

‘My girlfriend died.’

Because fuck. Jesus fuck oh god. Louis’ brain is in overdrive as the pieces all slam together into the most awful, awful picture and he scrambles for the correct response but there is none.

‘Fuck, that’s - that’s just awful Harry.’

‘I feel like,’ Harry continues, still staring at the ceiling. ‘I haven’t even had time to properly grieve. And I - I’ve been trying to tell you that I’m not coping, but you didn’t seem to get it and of course you didn’t because I hadn’t told you anything. Y’know,’ he says, turning on his side to face Louis again. ‘That’s what I like about you. You’re not nosy, like some people.’ His voice was sounding more earnest, a little more animated and less dead and hollow. ‘Every single other fucking nanny and babysitter I’ve had, fuck even cashiers at the supermarket, it’s always ‘where’s mummy?’’ He laughs bitterly. ‘Reminding me every day of what I’ve lost. But not you. So polite and respectful. It actually made it harder to tell you, because I couldn’t figure out how to say it.’

‘I’m sorry,’ says Louis quietly. ‘I didn’t mean to make it harder for you.’

‘Stop, don’t apologise.’ Harry said vehemently, his eyes boring into Louis’. ‘You were perfect. You are perfect.’ He lets out a strangled laugh as he breaks the eye contact, looking back up at the ceiling. ‘Fuck, that’s the other thing. I feel so fucking guilty.’

Louis doesn’t know what the fuck to say to that, so he’s immensely glad when Harry continues talking.

‘Like, okay I’m going to explain this the best I can. I - I’m a hopeless romantic, okay? I believe in ‘the one’ I believe in soulmates, stuff like that. And we were great together, we really were. But - I could never pinpoint exactly what it was, I think it was a combination of a few different things, but I just knew she wasn’t the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And I was so upset when I realised this Louis because we were great together, we really were.’ Harry had rolled back over to face Louis now, and Louis could see the emotion and urgency on his face, the need to make Louis understand.

‘So I decided,’ he continues. ‘To end the relationship when I realised this. We hadn’t been together long, only about like, two months or so I think? But when I went to go talk to her about it, she told me she was pregnant with Ariel before I could say anything. She’d just found out.’

‘Oh Harry.’ Louis says softly.

‘I never said anything,’ Harry chokes out. He’d started to cry again. ‘I never told her how I really felt and I don’t know if it makes me a bad or a good person.’

Louis’ heart breaks seeing Harry like this, and a small part of him thinks he might be overstepping, but mostly he’s sure, very sure, that Harry needs a hug right now.

‘Come here,’ he says, holding his arm out in a gesture. Harry doesn’t need telling twice, immediately extricating himself from the blankets, launching himself into Louis’ arms, crying into his shoulder. Louis just holds him, holds him tight.

Louis doesn’t know how long they stay like that, but at some point he becomes aware of another cry, softly, faintly through the wall. Louis' heart drops when he raises his head a little to see across the room. The baby monitor on Harry’s bedside table is dark, no lights blinking to indicate it’s turned on.

‘Harry,’ he says gently, tapping him. ‘Harry, sorry, I have to get up.’

‘Stay,’ he says, his voice sounding choked. It had seemed to take him a long time to stop crying, and he’d only just barely stopped, which was probably why Louis had heard Ariel.

‘I’m sorry, I have to get her, I don’t know how long she’s been crying, I couldn’t hear her, the baby monitor’s off.’

Harry freezes. ‘I forgot I did that.’

A sick feeling pools in Louis' gut. Without another word, he extricates himself from Harry and practically races to Ariel’s room. She’s a little red in the face from crying, but otherwise seems okay. Her cries subside a little as Louis holds her.

‘I’m so sorry, so sorry baby. I didn’t hear you,’ he babbles, guilt flooding through him. He should have checked the damn baby monitor. But he hadn’t thought to, because, well, until today, Harry had always had it turned on.

Ariel starts crying again as Louis changes her nappy, and doesn't stop while he heads to the kitchen, and struggles with the difficult task of making formula one handed, her cries only subsiding once she takes the bottle. Louis allows himself to sit at one of the kitchen stools while he feeds her for a few minutes, mainly to collect his thoughts and just breathe for a fucking second, trying to process everything that just happened.

Harry seems to be cocooned back in his blankets when Louis re-enters his room, Ariel still in his arms as she’s not even halfway through her bottle. 

‘Harry?’ He calls out softly, so as to hopefully not startle the other man. Harry responds by sitting up in bed, eyes wide. Louis sits down on the edge of the bed near Harry, trying not to jostle Ariel too much in the process. ‘I’m sorry I left you like that before,’ he says carefully, once he settles himself on the bed. ‘When you asked me to stay. I would have stayed if I could.’

Harry nods slowly. ‘It’s okay. I understand.’ He replies. Louis makes eye contact with him, and Harry quickly breaks it, looking away. Louis frowns. Did he really? Did he really understand that Ariel was the priority? If so, why had the baby monitor been off?

‘Harry, I know you’re having a really hard time of it now, love, but I need to know - why was the baby monitor off?’

Harry looks defensive. ‘She wouldn’t stay asleep when I put her in the cot, so I left her to cry herself to sleep. The crying was too loud on the baby monitor, so I turned it off.’

Louis pauses. That wasn’t that bad. Sure, it wasn’t really a popular method to use to put babies to sleep, especially one this young. It wasn’t a method he used personally himself, but there wasn’t really anything inherently dangerous about it.

‘Thank you for telling me. And you just forgot to turn it back on, after she had gone to sleep?’

Harry bites his lip. ‘Uh, not exactly.’

A chill runs down Louis' spine. ‘What do you mean, not exactly?’

‘I didn’t want it on.’ He replies quietly, still not looking at Louis.

This statement worries Louis to his core. It was so, so out of character from the Harry he’d experienced since meeting him, always so meticulous, making sure Ariel’s every need was met. Something was seriously wrong.

‘Hey,’ he says quietly. He wishes he could reach out and touch him, to give him some comfort, but Ariel’s still finishing her bottle, and his arms are full. ‘I know it’s nowhere near the same thing, but I went through a pretty rough time a few years ago, and there were a few things that helped me get out of a really low place, if you wanna try?’

Harry looks up at him, and does make eye contact then, his eyes serious. ‘Just because you haven’t experienced my trauma, does not make your pain any less valid.’

Louis is extremely thrown by this considerate statement, and if anything, it just confuses him more, because Harry was seemingly concerned with Louis’ well-being while he was mid breakdown but not his own daughters. He pushes the thought out of his mind for now, focusing on Harry.

‘That’s - that’s exactly right Harry, thank you. I’m glad you understand. Do you want to try some of the things that helped me?’

Harry nods, but doesn’t say anything. Louis thinks fast about what might work best to get Harry into a clearer head space.

‘How about I make us some lunch, and we can take it down to the park? Start with that?’

Harry looks up at him. ‘Is it that simple?’

Louis shrugs. ‘Normally not, no. But it’s a good start.’ He starts to get up, Ariel is nearly finished with her bottle and he wants to get started on lunch and get Harry out of the house as soon as possible. Before he can get up though, Harry stops him, putting a hand on his knee. Louis turns his head to him.

‘I’m scared,’ he whispers, and he looks it too.

‘Hey,’ Louis says, as soothingly as possible. ‘I’ve got ya. It’s gonna be okay.’

Chapter Text

Louis goes back to check on Harry after he’s hastily thrown together some sandwiches. He’d packed them along with some fruit, and those cans of mineral water Harry always has in the fridge, into the nappy bag, the food nestled amongst Ariel’s spare clothes so (hopefully) nothing will get squashed. He’s left Ariel laying on her rug in the living room where she’d been happy all the time he was making lunch, so he hopes she’ll be fine for a few more minutes. He’s got the baby monitor shoved into his pocket, anyway.

When he enters Harry’s room, he’s pleased to see Harry is out of bed. He’s standing over by his chest of drawers still in his pyjamas, one hand on an open chest of drawers. Louis tries to make noise so as not to startle him, but Harry jumps and looks up at Louis with mild panic, so it seems his efforts were in vain.

‘What ya gonna wear?’ Louis asks, coming over to stand by the drawer next to Harry.

‘I don’t know,’ said Harry blankly. ‘There’s too many choices. I’ve been standing here for ages.’ He looks at Louis helplessly.

‘Can I pick?’ he asks. Louis knows all too well from his own experiences that sometimes the simplest decisions can be overwhelming when he’s in a really low place.

Harry nods gratefully, taking a step back from the drawers. Louis rummages around and picks out a pair of grey and black patterned trousers that look comfortable, as well as a plain white t-shirt and some black socks and underwear. He looks around the room in vain to see if Harry owns any kind of trainers, but he can’t see any and wouldn’t know where to start looking. Instead, he simply grabs the pair of black boots he can see and places them on the floor at the end of the bed, with all the rest of the clothes piled on the actual bed. Harry immediately moves to start putting them on and Louis takes this as a good sign. He turns around both to give Harry his privacy and to head to the bathroom to find hair stuff, because he highly doubts Harry wants to go out in public with his hair in its current state.

The bathroom is clean like the rest of the flat, and, as Louis discovers once he starts going through the drawers, feels distinctly un-lived in. There are no old or half used toiletries, and when Louis finally finds some hair ties and clips it’s all brand new, most of them still in sealed packets. It’s like Harry threw away all his supplies and started again. Louis’ mouth goes dry when he realises Harry has done exactly that. If his girlfriend had long hair as well they would have likely shared all that stuff. He’s not surprised Harry just chucked the lot.

Quickly, he grabs the baby pink hairbrush, some hairpins, a couple of plain brown hair ties (there are pretty ones but Louis hasn’t seen Harry wear any of them yet, so he leaves them for now) and a bottle of detangler. Checking in on Ariel on the way (who is still fine) he heads back to Harry’s room.

Harry is now dressed in the clothing Louis selected, albeit the boots. It looks as though he was about to start putting them on, but he stops when Louis comes in. Louis holds up the supplies he’s carrying as if in question. Harry nods and immediately sits down on the floor at the end of the bed. His body language already indicates that he wants Louis to do his hair, but Louis checks before he touches Harry, just in case.

‘You okay for me to do it?’ He asks, while he can still see Harry’s face. 

Harry nods vehemently, followed by a squeaked out ‘If that’s okay?’ As Louis moves to sit behind him on the bed.

‘More than okay,’ Louis replies as he sprays Harry’s hair with detangler. ‘I like doing hair.’ He had already planned on doing Harry’s hair for him, not because he wanted to baby him or thought he wasn’t capable, but as a distraction technique to help calm him.

‘Why do you not have long hair then?’ Harry pipes up, surprising Louis with the question as he starts to brush through the ends of Harry’s hair.

‘Where did that question come from?’ He replies, laughing lightly.

‘You said you like doing hair. So I was wondering why you don’t have long hair yourself. You can do so much more with long hair.’ Harry’s voice sounds a bit stronger now than it had before, and Louis takes this as a good sign.

‘I don’t think long hair suits me,’ he chuckles as he works on a particularly tough tangle in Harry’s hair. ‘Does that hurt, love?’

‘A bit, but it’s fine. How do you know? How long have you grown it out?’ Asks Harry, sounding genuinely interested.

‘Just, like, a bit past my chin,’ Louis replies as he starts brushing Harry’s hair up onto the top of his head. ‘I didn’t like it.’

‘I’m sure it did look good,’ Harry responds. ‘But I like how it is now.’

Currently, Louis’ hair is cut short with the top left long, which he usually wears in a fringe swept to the side or styles into a quiff if he’s feeling fancy. ‘Thanks,’ he replies, wrapping the hair tie around Harry’s now completed bun to secure it. ‘All done. You ready to go?’

Harry touches the top of his head to feel the completed bun and nods, murmuring a quiet ‘thank you,’ as he does so.

After successfully wrangling Harry and Ariel out of the flat and into the lift, the trio emerge in the ground floor lobby of Harry’s building.

‘I probably should have checked this before, but I’m assuming there is actually a park nearby?’ Louis asks, laughing a little as he pushes the pram towards the exit.

Harry moves a little faster to get ahead of Louis so he can hold the door open for him. ‘Yes,’ he replies with a soft smile, looking at Louis fondly as Louis pushes the pram through the held open door. ‘It’s just this way, only about a five minute walk.’

They don’t talk as Harry leads them on the short walk to the park. Louis is enjoying being outside and feeling the light breeze on his face, his blood pumping as he walks slightly faster than normal to keep up with Harry’s long strides.

‘Behold!’ Harry says with a grin, turning around and spreading his arms wide as they reach the small park. It looks to be empty except for a woman with two small children standing near a duck pond, and there are lots of shady trees. They pick a flat spot with a view of the pond and spread out the picnic rug.

‘I’m feeling a bit better already,’ Harry says as he flops down on the rug.

‘That’s good,’ Louis replies as he lifts Ariel out of the pram and joins Harry to sit on the rug. ‘Do you wanna get out the food?’ He asks, as he gets Ariel comfortable lying on the rug.

Harry agrees and starts emptying out the nappy bag, exclaiming over the items as he does. ‘Ooh, avocado! I love avocados. And I love these drinks. Ooh there’s fruit too!’

Louis laughs gently, happy to see Harry’s enthusiasm. ‘I should hope you like the food, love, it is from your fridge after all.’

Harry laughs as well as he passes Louis one of the sandwiches, unwrapping the other. ‘Yeah, but like, you put it together,’ he replies. ‘I would have never thought to pair cheese and avocado in a sandwich, for instance,’ he replies as he inspects his sandwich filling.

‘I hope it’s good,’ Louis replies fervently, unwrapping his own sandwich. ‘I have literally never made an avocado sandwich before. I basically just put everything in your fridge that vaguely resembled a sandwich filling on bread.’

Harry laughs again before taking a bite, and Louis smiles at the sound of his laughter. ‘Oh my god!’ Harry exclaims after he’s swallowed his mouthful. ‘This is good Lou! In fact, you know what it would be really good with? Bacon.’

Louis frowns in confusion as he chews his mouthful, which is actually surprisingly good, the tanginess of the cheese and pepperiness of the rocket balanced out by the bread and avocado. ‘Bacon?’ He repeats, after he’s swallowed his own mouthful. ‘I thought you were a vegetarian?’

‘What?’ Harry replies, looking at Louis with a mixture of amusement and confusion. ‘Why’d you think that?’

‘There is literally not a speck of meat in your fridge or freezer Harold, I thought it was a pretty logical conclusion!’

‘Oh!’ He says. ‘No, I do eat meat, I just don’t normally buy it because…’ his voice trails off, his tone changing from his previous enthusiasm. Louis looks over at him, Harry is staring down at his lap, his eyebrows pinched together in a frown. 

‘Haz?’

Harry lets out a breath and looks up at Louis, his eyes sad as he makes eye contact. ‘Sorry, I just - it’s stupid. I was going to say I don’t buy meat cause she’s - she was -,’ voice hitching as he corrects himself. ‘A vegetarian. But it doesn’t even matter now and I just realised I’ve been buying the exact same groceries for weeks.’ He finishes, the words tumbling out faster than he normally speaks.

‘Oh Harry,’ Louis soothes. ‘I’m sorry love, I wouldn’t have brought it up if I’d known. And it’s not stupid, okay?’

Harry bites his lip and looks up at Louis. ‘I feel kind of stupid.’

‘Look love,’ he says, keeping the soothing tone to his voice. ‘You’ve had so many drastic changes to your life in such a short amount of time, it’s not surprising you wanted to keep some routines familiar, even unconsciously. It’s not something to feel silly about or even worry about. It literally doesn’t matter, it’s just food. You can keep the exact same order or buy all the bacon in the store Haz, it’s up to you. As long as there’s some sort of food in the flat for us to eat.’

Harry gives a small smile. ‘How do you always seem to know exactly what to say?’

Louis laughs. ‘A lot of the time I don’t, but I seem to want to get it right with you. My brain has not worked this hard in years.’

They both laugh at that, and Louis warms at the sight of Harry’s grin mid-laugh, his eyes still a little sad but crinkled at the corners all the same. He takes another bite of his sandwich and chews thoughtfully.

‘What food do you like?’ He asks after he’s swallowed his mouthful.

‘Um, why?’ Louis asks, partly in curiosity at the question, but partly to stall, because he’s trying to figure out how to answer the question without offending Harry, as he has never seen most of his favourite foods in Harry’s fridge.

‘Say if, like, I do decide to change up the groceries I buy, maybe I should buy some things you like? It might help as a starting point, and give me some new ideas for things to make.’ He says, looking at Louis hopefully.

‘Well,’ he begins. ‘Most of my favourite foods are, like, incredibly unhealthy and I already eat entirely too much of them so please don’t start buying those, I can barely fit into my jeans as it is.’ He flushes self consciously at the thought, then firmly pushes it out of his mind. He is not letting his mind go down that road right now. He can have a pity party for himself later, when he’s on his own. Right now, Harry needs him.

‘No, tell me!’ Harry says, his eyes lighting up. ‘I’m like, really good at making things healthy, if that’s what you want?’

‘I dunno if you can make a burger and chips healthy, or pizza, but those are two of my favourites.’

‘I can!’ Harry says excitedly. ‘I already have so many ideas. This is helping Lou, what else?’

Louis considers. ‘I miss my mum’s cooking. Roasts, bangers and mash, that sort of thing.’

‘Yes, yes!’ Says Harry happily. ‘I want to make those too. What else, like what do you cook at home?’

‘Um,’ Louis starts, embarrassed. ‘I’m not like, a very good cook? So I normally get takeaway. But I’ve been trying to cut down on that, so sometimes I’ll make a simple pasta dish, or like an omelette or something.’ Sometimes, on bad days, he doesn’t eat at all, but he leaves that part out.

Harry grins wickedly. ‘Define ‘normally get takeaway’’. And don’t lie!’

Louis groans, covering his face in his hands. ‘You are going to judge me so hard.’

‘Probably.’ Louis peeks through his fingers to see that Harry has a shit-eating grin on his face. 

‘Being absolutely honest, before I got this job, I probably had takeaway about five or six nights a week.’

Harry positively howls with laughter, startling Ariel and causing the woman feeding the ducks to look over in their direction. Louis picks up Ariel as he watches Harry’s antics, as the baby had started to cry, not liking the loud noise of her father’s outburst. 

‘Sorry baby girl,’ Harry chokes out in between laughter. ‘Okay yes, you’re right Louis, I am judging you so hard right now but I think you know you deserve it.’

Louis’ cheeks warm in embarrassment at Harry’s disapproval as he hugs Ariel, because even though he knows it’s all in good fun, the thought of Harry disapproving of his actions makes his gut twist uncomfortably. His sometimes debilitating crush on Harry had been shoved to the side earlier that morning when there were more serious matters at hand, and Louis had been too much in the moment to even really think about it since he’d found Harry crying that morning, too focused on Harry’s bombshell and taking care of Harry and Ariel. But now that Harry was seeming a little more himself, it had wormed its way to the front of his mind again. And apparently he was still so far gone for Harry that he couldn’t even bear even the slightest little bit of disapproval from him. Jesus, he needed to get a grip. If he’d thought his crush was inappropriate before because Harry was his boss, it was now ten times more inappropriate to be fawning over a man who he now knew was grieving his dead girlfriend. Fuck.

‘Anyway Louis,’ Louis is startled out of his reverie as he realises Harry has stopped laughing and is now speaking to him. Ariel has now stopped crying too, which is good. ‘I cannot allow this behaviour to continue. I,’ he began dramatically, placing his hand on his chest over his heart. ‘Am going to teach you how to cook.’

They finished off the rest of the sandwiches, fruit, and mineral waters, Harry chatting Louis’ ear off, describing all the meals he wants to teach Louis to make. While he seems excited and happy, Louis knows it’s highly unlikely his extremely unsettled mental state from earlier has completely flipped. Harry is distracted, yes, which was really the only thing Louis had hoped to be able to do, but he is in no way magically cured of his grief and depression. He never will be, but Louis hopes for Harry’s sake that it gets to more manageable stages that are less severe. 

Harry pauses (after regaling Louis with multiple descriptions of supposedly healthy pizza he wanted to show Louis how to make) to take a sip of his mineral water. ‘Lou,’ he says, in a different tone of voice to his excited prattle from just a few seconds ago, his voice more serious and wavering slightly. ‘I need to talk to you about something.’

Chapter Text

Louis, who had been contently watching the ducks in the pond while listening to Harry’s pizza descriptions, starts at the change in Harry’s tone of voice and turns to look at him. He looks scared; his green eyes full of fear as they meet Louis’.

‘What is it love?’ Louis asks kindly.

‘I - I wasn’t able to get an appointment to see my grief counsellor until tomorrow. I told them it was an emergency but that was the earliest they could get me in.’

Louis is simultaneously relieved and proud that Harry has made this step on his own. He had been ruminating in the back of his mind if - no, when, he should bring up the topic of Harry seeing a professional, because while he knew he was capable of, and wanted to, care for Harry’s immediate needs and listen to him and distract him when his thoughts got too dark, it was too much for him to take on all by himself. 

Louis feels a wave of guilt hit him, because the thought is actually so hypocritical of him. He had just dumped all his shit on Zayn all those months ago and refused to get help when he really, really did need it. Shit. He really needs to make things right with Zayn, properly apologise to him. But that is something he needs to think about another time, because he needs to focus on Harry right now.

‘I can tell you wanted it to be sooner love, and I’m so sorry. But at least you know you’ve definitely got that appointment tomorrow. You will get to see them.’

Harry nods. ‘Thank you. But I really should have called them straight away, as soon as they opened. When I woke up this morning, I knew something was really wrong, I just felt awful, so detached from reality. And my emotions were just all over the place.’

Louis pulls Harry into a rough, slightly awkward hug, given the angles they are sitting at, but the sentiment is received all the same, and Louis can tell Harry is grateful from the way his body folds into his. ‘I’m so sorry, love. I’m so sorry you’re going through this, it’s just positively awful. Don’t beat yourself up about when you called them, the main thing is you did call them, and you have an appointment, and your counsellor is going to help you tomorrow, okay?’

Harry breathes heavily as they pull apart and Louis sees fresh tears have stained Harry’s cheeks. He knows he shouldn’t but he wants desperately to wipe them away, and he raises his hand to Harry’s cheek tentatively. ‘Can I?’ He asks softly, and Harry nods and closes his eyes. Gently, with the pad of his thumb, he wipes at the wetness of Harry’s tears. The gesture feels so incredibly intimate to Louis, and his heart hurts because it has been sliced to ribbons witnessing this brave, broken boy. Harry sighs contentedly and opens his eyes as Louis draws his hand away from Harry’s face. The moment seems charged, somehow, but both men seem unsure of how to proceed.

‘When did you end up calling them?’ Louis asks. It’s partly out of curiosity, but mostly, he needs something to focus on other than the confused tangle of thoughts swirling around his head.

Harry blinks as the moment is broken, looking slightly startled. ‘Um, while you were making lunch. After you, um, called me out on my behaviour,’ he says quietly, cheeks flushing.

‘Harry -’

‘No Louis, let me say this. You were so right to call me out on it, and I’m so glad you did because it actually helped me process what was happening. But it was terrifying at the same time because you didn’t even get mad, not really, you were just being so lovely and talking kindly to me. And that’s when I realised how far out of my own control my actions, my own decision making had gotten. It scared me so much, I made the call as soon as you left the room.’

‘I’m so proud of you Harry, for making that call,’ Louis says, breaking the eye contact only briefly to pick up Ariel, who had started to fuss. He nestles her against his chest, and she quietens.

‘Thanks,’ he says. ‘And I just want to say, Louis, everything you’ve done today has just been exactly what I needed. You were flippant about it before Louis, but I heard what you said and I know it to be true. You want to get it right with me. You put more thought into your words and actions with me than you normally would. I don’t know what makes me so special but I couldn’t have asked for a better person to help me through today. For listening to me, and holding me while I cried, even picking my clothes and doing my hair, god that helped so much Louis you have no idea.’

Louis’ heart swells with the praise and he is so glad that he has helped Harry, even in some small way. 

‘But I’m still very very far from okay Louis, and because of that I have yet another thing to ask of you.’

‘Of course,’ Louis agrees. ‘What is it?’

‘You can say no,’ Harry says quickly. ‘I mean, I can’t imagine this day has been easy for you either and you probably need a break from me but - can we all stay together tonight? The three of us? Probably at yours since I seem to remember you said there are more beds but it doesn’t really matter.’ He sighs and rubs his eyes, looking exhausted.

‘Of course!’ Louis is quick to agree, mainly to assuage Harry’s anxiety. But also because this is what he actually wants to happen too, and he’s relieved Harry suggested it. He hadn’t actually made up his mind completely yet, but he had been thinking it over in the back of his head ever since he confronted Harry about the baby monitor, and he’d been thinking he really would prefer it if Harry wasn’t alone with Ariel tonight. Not because he thought Harry wasn’t capable, he doubted he’d do anything like deliberately leaving the baby monitor off again. Now Harry has been able to process it somewhat, Louis is confident he is aware of the gravity of the situation. After all, he did seem to be legitimately horrified at what he’d done, when he thanked Louis for calling him out on it. No, it’s not that, exactly. It’s more the fact that he doesn’t think burdening Harry with the sole responsibility of a child in the mental state he’s in is going to help him, or be fair to him, not if there’s another option. And the way Harry’s eyes were pleading, boring into Louis’, and the way he’d looked a little embarrassed, ashamed even when he asked the favour makes Louis suspect that Harry doesn’t want to be alone with Ariel either. Regardless, it doesn’t matter exactly what Harry’s reasoning is because he wants the same arrangement for tonight as Louis, and Louis is more than satisfied with that. He’s not going to make Harry spell out his exact reasoning for requesting they all stay together if he doesn’t want to. 

‘Really?’ Says Harry, already looking relieved. 

‘Absolutely,’ Louis confirms. ‘We can go to mine, if you like, you were right, there are more beds. Or if you’d be more comfy at home, I can just kip on the couch, I don’t mind.’

‘You could just sleep in my bed,’ Harry replies. Louis is a little confused, because, yes, had said he was happy to continue that conversation, but now hardly seems the time. Harry seems to realise this too, because he almost immediately slaps his hand over his mouth as if he can’t believe what he’s just said. ‘Oh my god I don’t know what’s wrong with me, I swear I have no filter,’ he continues, obviously distressed.

Louis remembers something Harry said yesterday when they were having their fight-slash-discussion about the lost phone number. ‘Not emotionally stable enough for this conversation, darling?’ He tries.

Harry looks up, eyes wide. ‘Yes! Yes that’s it exactly! Sorry, I just – my brain is like complete mush right now. Completely wrong timing to say that. Sorry.’

Louis smiles, and this is no good because Louis is getting his hopes up now which needs to stop right this second. Knowing Louis’ luck, when Harry is emotionally stable enough for this conversation, it’s not going to turn out the way Louis wants. But for now, he has a flicker of hope, and a beautiful boy smiling through his sadness sitting in front of him. ‘It’s okay,’ he replies.

‘I just need to get through things one at a time, and preferably in some semblance of logical order,’ Harry says, looking a bit calmer now. ‘Be patient with me?’

‘Of course,’ agrees Louis, though he is dying of curiosity. ‘So, if that comment regarding sleeping arrangements wasn’t meant to be on the agenda for this afternoon, what is? What do you need?’

Harry considers this. ‘I don’t know if I have the energy to cook, but I’d like to get ingredients just in case. Might be a nice distraction. Then go to yours, I guess. That’s all I’ve got for now.’

Louis nods as he stands up carefully with Ariel, transferring her to the pram, before turning back to Harry, who is still sitting on the rug, staring out at the distance looking a little lost. ‘Ready to go Haz?’ He asks gently, holding out a hand to help Harry up. Harry blinks and looks up at him, slightly startled. He takes Louis’ proffered hand and stands up, not letting go once he’s upright. His larger hand is smooth and soft and warm clutching Louis’ smaller one. They smile at each other for a second and then quickly drop hands, moving to pack up the picnic rug.

They head back to Harry’s and pack up everything they’ll need for the night, before heading for Louis’. They stop at a supermarket along the way, so that Harry can purchase his pizza makings. Harry asks Louis to drive when they leave the grocery store, even though they are in Harry’s car. Louis is glad he’s driving, because Harry falls asleep almost immediately. It’s not a long drive, and Louis procrastinates waking him when they get home, bringing in everything else possible before returning to the car for Harry. 

‘Hey,’ he says softly as he gently opens the car door, touching Harry lightly on the shoulder. Harry jumps a little as he wakes, looking around at his surroundings before looking up at Louis.

‘Hey,’ he repeats, rubbing his eyes before fumbling with his seatbelt.

‘I already brought in your bag. And your groceries. And your baby.’

Harry chuckles. ‘Thanks,’ he says as he climbs out of the car.

‘Do you feel better, after having a nap?’ Louis asks as they make their way inside.

‘I don’t know,’ says Harry slowly. ‘I still feel tired, but I probably shouldn’t go back to sleep now or I’ll be up all night. I might read for a bit.’

‘Good idea,’ Louis muses as he closes the door behind him.

‘Is Ariel asleep?’ Harry asks as he spots his duffel sitting by the living room couch and makes his way towards it.

‘Yeah,’ replies Louis as he heads to the kitchen to unpack the groceries. ‘She fell asleep in the car too.’

The afternoon passes in silence for a little while Harry reads and Louis packs away the assortment of groceries Harry bought, which seem to be mostly the makings for pizza but there are a few questionable toppings he’s not sure belong on pizza.

When he finishes his task he looks up to find that Harry is no longer curled on the couch with a book like he was when he last saw him, but instead he’s got a laptop perched on the couch next to him, and a notebook and pen in his hands. He’s curious, but stays silent for a bit, just looking at him. The crease between his eyebrows has returned as he scribbles in the notebook. Watching him, Louis feels quite overwhelmed by the events of the day, if he’s honest. It’s devastating now he knows just how much Harry is suffering, and why. But it’s also good, in a way, because he feels like he's a bit better equipped to help Harry, now he knows more about his circumstances.

He feels like doesn’t have much left of himself to give. The scraps of his own tattered heart and soul are tangled up so tightly in his own mental health problems, so persistent and energy-draining they have wormed their way into his very identity. It’s disgustingly self indulgent. Surely he can spare a shred of mental energy for Harry, remove a block from the tower of toxic thoughts in the insane hope it will all come falling down. Hate himself a little less, so he can love Harry a little more. It’s not much, but he’s going to try his fucking hardest to be there for Harry, and help him in any small way he can.

Chapter Text

‘What are you doing?’ Louis says curiously in his light, high voice, and Harry starts involuntarily, his pen skidding across the paper. God, he is so jumpy today. Ever since Louis had left his room and he’d called the clinic his anxiety had been at an all-time high, thrumming through his body constantly. His nerves feel frayed raw.

‘Um, kind of working?’ he says, looking up at Louis like he’s asking him what he’s doing. He’s so out of it he kind of doesn’t know. Louis chuckles and comes over to sit on the couch, which is big enough that Harry’s laptop isn’t in the way as Louis sits at the other end.

‘What does that mean?’ Louis asks, smiling as he says it, and it makes Harry feel like such utter shit because Louis is so beautiful. He found him again, the beautiful boy with the blue eyes, but he found him at the absolute worst time of his life. He is grateful he found him though, because he doesn’t know what he would do without Louis. But, at the same time, he’s also sad. He feels like the chances of actually being with Louis, like he wanted to all those years ago, are slowly slipping away. Because Harry’s not ready, and he doesn’t know when he’ll be ready. He’d thought Louis maybe liked him. Hell, he did say he’d be happy to talk about it more, but that was yesterday. Harry doubts Louis is going to continue to feel that way now that he knows what a complete mess Harry is. He writes a lyric on the page:

What if I’m someone I don’t want around?

‘Harry?’ Louis says and Harry jumps again, startled out of his own thoughts. Fuck anxiety. He then realises Louis had asked him a question before, and he’d never answered.

‘Oh, um, like, I’m writing some lyrics but they’re really sad, I doubt they’re going to work for what my producers want for the album. So, hence, kind of working.’

Louis nods thoughtfully but he doesn’t say anything straight away and Harry’s mind is racing now, his anxiety causing his mind to overthink and worry about the conversations he’s had with Louis. ‘When I said, be patient with me back in the park, I didn’t mean wait for me,’ he blurts out suddenly.

Louis frowns. ‘What?’

‘I mean – like, god, Louis, I don’t know when I’m going to be ready, I mean it could be weeks, months even, and I just realised it might have sounded like wait for me which would be really fucking self-centred and manipulative. And it doesn’t even matter now anyway.’ Because you’ll stop liking me soon enough, if you haven’t already, he adds in his head. His breathing is faster than normal, and he realises he’s just spoken those last couple of sentences way faster than he normally speaks. Is he on the verge of having a panic attack? Just his luck to top off this hellhole of a day.

Louis continues to frown, and he moves the computer to the end of the couch so he can sit closer to Harry. ‘Love,’ he says gently. ‘I thought you wanted to talk about this when you were feeling better?’

Harry feels a lump in his throat and tears spring to his eyes. ‘But when will that be?’

Louis seems to know just what he needs and shifts closer to him to envelope him in a hug. Harry melts into it and cries into his shoulder for the second time that day, and as he cries, he realises his breathing is slowing a little, he is calming down, which is good. He breaks the hug and makes eye contact with Louis, trying to silently thank him because the words won’t come out.

‘I’m just going to say this, for now, okay?’ Louis says, placing a hand gently on Harry’s shoulder. ‘I think that at some point, in the future, we could be really good together, and if that happens, if the timing works out for both of us, then that’s great. But for now, I think we need to work on ourselves, not just you, I need to as well.’

Harry wipes his eyes. ‘What do you mean?’

Louis looks uncomfortable, and Harry wonders if he’s overstepped. But he asked because he wants to know what Louis’ thinking, it’s helping him to get a bit of clarity on the situation.

‘I -’ Louis starts, and stops, shaking his head. Harry is about to interrupt to say he doesn’t have to share if he’s not comfortable, but then Louis continues talking.

‘There are some things I’ve been dealing with all on my own, for the last few months. I didn't get professional help straight away because I didn’t even want to acknowledge what had happened, but I’m in a place now where I can acknowledge it, and I think it will help if I talk about it with a professional.’

Harry wonders, as he processes this, if Louis is talking about the self-harm scars on his left arm. They look old, but Harry’s not sure if scars look any different if they’re months old or years old. Louis hasn’t made any effort to hide the scars from Harry, always wearing t-shirts around the house, but Harry’s not sure if this is an open invitation to ask about them. He supposes now potentially would be a good time, but he’s not sure if he wants to get into such a heavy conversation with his mind in the state it’s in.

‘That’s really good Lou,’ Harry says, smiling warmly at him. ‘That sounds like it was probably a difficult step to make.’

Louis nods. ‘It was. Thanks.’

It’s at this point that Harry realises that his lyric book has been sitting open on the arm of the couch this entire time, and he hurriedly moves to close it, looking over worriedly at Louis, wondering if he’d seen. It’s not that he doesn’t want to share them, he wants to share them with the world. He wants the song to be greenlit for the album, even though it probably won’t. But right now, they are too fresh, and he doesn’t want Louis to see just yet.

‘I didn’t look, love,’ Louis says softly.

Harry sighs in relief. ‘Sorry,’ he says weakly. ‘I mean, I just wrote them and -’

Louis nods, looking like he understands. ‘It’s okay, I get it. I actually, um, write songs too, a bit.’

Harry is surprised, and excited to discover yet another new thing about Louis. ‘You do? Maybe you can help me come up with something the producers will actually like. That song I was writing is way too sad.’

Louis nods as Harry opens his lyric book and turns to a fresh page. ‘What are they looking for?’

Harry sighs. ‘They want the next Watermelon Sugar. The problem is, most of my songs aren’t really like that, in fact it’s sort of the outlier. They say there’s a few options that could work for the next single, but I still have time to come up with something new as well.’

Louis nods, looking thoughtful. ‘Wait here a sec,’ he says, and gets up from the couch, heading into one of the rooms off the living room, the one with the door slightly ajar. He’s confused for a second because he realises that’s not the room Louis went into last time he was over to get changed. Does Ariel sleep in Louis’ room when she’s here? Why would she sleep in there when Louis has a whole second bedroom? He decides to ask as Louis returns, carrying a laptop.

‘Does Ariel sleep in your room?’

‘Huh?’ responds Louis, as he sits down on the couch next to Harry, turning on the laptop. ‘Oh, yeah, she does. I tried to make that her room,’ he says, pointing to the second bedroom. ‘So it’d be the same setup as yours. But I'm not super familiar with controlled crying, or cry it out, or whatever method you use. We never did it at the daycare, cause they’d all just wake each other up if they cried. So normally I’d just sit in the nursery for a bit, and the babies would normally just stay quiet and just go to sleep even if they were still awake when I put them down, because they knew I was right there. So I just do the same thing with her, she doesn’t cry if she knows I’m right next to her.’

Harry instantly feels like he’s doing parenting wrong, a thought that is not new to him but has been constantly cropping up. The self-doubt had been niggling away at him ever since Ariel was born, slowly destroying his confidence.

‘Anyway,’ Louis continues, clicking away at his computer. ‘I can try it your way, if you want, I just need to do a bit of research, make sure I’m doing it right.’

Harry knows Louis doesn’t mean to shatter his soul with these words, but he’s so fragile right now they slice right through to his core. He knows he doesn’t do controlled crying right. The problem was he’d looked up a few different methods, and he did settle on one. But when he’s tired, the amount of times he’s supposed to check on her and how long he’s supposed to let her cry just meld together in his brain. He ends up winging it most of the time.

‘No,’ he says softly, making a real effort not to start crying again. He’s cried too much today already. ‘Just do what you’re used to, if that’s working.’

‘Okay,’ Louis says, bringing up a few programs on his computer. ‘It’ll be good for tonight anyway, cause you’ll have a bedroom all to yourself, and hopefully you’ll be able to get a good sleep.’

‘Yeah,’ Harry says softly. He peers over at the laptop, desperately needing a distraction from his thoughts right now. ‘Are you looking up some songs you’ve written?’

Louis nods. ‘Yeah. I mean we can write something together from scratch, of course, if you want. Or we can use something I’ve already written or partly written as a starting point. But I think I’ve got something that might be pretty much good to go, if you want to have a listen?’

Harry nods eagerly. Ideally, he’d love to write or partially write all of his songs, but he just doesn’t think he can come up with the happy, pop lyrics his label wants right now. If Louis has something completed that works, honestly at this point he’s happy with that.

‘Okay,’ Louis says. The cursor is hovering over the play button on a track, but he’s not clicking play. He looks over at Harry, looking a little embarrassed. ‘The lyrics are – um, well I think they’re kind of funny, actually, and I think it suits your style but if you don’t like it that’s okay.’

‘Louis, just play the song, I do have to actually hear the thing to decide if I like it or not.’ He’s surprised to hear a small giggle come out of his mouth as he talks.

Louis nods, sighs, and presses play. The track starts, and it’s not high quality, it’s not professional, it’s literally just Louis singing with a guitar.

Stained coffee cup
Just a fingerprint of lipstick's not enough

Harry carefully notes the mention of lipstick. He’s not sure how he came to this assumption, but for some reason, he’d had in his head that Louis was strictly into guys. Of course, he of all people should know that sexuality is extremely fluid and to not put labels on people. Also, potentially it’s about a man wearing lipstick. The thought intrigues him.

Sleep, where you lay
Still a trace of innocence on the pillow case
Waking up
Beside you, I'm a loaded gun
I can't contain this anymore
I'm all yours, I've got no control
No control
Powerless
And I don't care, it's obvious
I just can't get enough of you
The pedal's down, my eyes are closed
No control
Taste on my tongue
I don't want to wash away the night before
In the heat where you laid
I could stay right here and burn in it all day

Harry cannot believe these lyrics. They are so blatant, yet so catchy and sexy at the same time. He loves the song, but he’s not sure if he can sing it without blushing.

Waking up
Beside you, I'm a loaded gun
I can't contain this anymore
I'm all yours, I've got no control
No control
Powerless
And I don't care, it's obvious
I just can't get enough of you
The pedal's down, my eyes are closed
No control
Lost my senses
I'm defenceless
Her perfume's holding me ransom

Her, he notes. Interesting. So the song is about a woman?

Sweet and sour
I devour
Lying here I count the hours
Waking up
Beside you, I'm a loaded gun
I can't contain this anymore
I'm all yours, I got no control
No control
Powerless
And I don't care, it's obvious
I just can't get enough of you
The pedal's down, my eyes are closed
No control
No control
No control
Powerless
And I don't care, it's obvious
I just can't get enough of you
The pedal's down, my eyes are closed
No control

The song ends, and Louis is looking at Harry expectantly for his reaction. He tries to gather his thoughts on the song to give a proper opinion, but all he can blurt out is the thing that’s at the forefront of his mind, without thinking properly. ‘It’s about a woman?’

Chapter Text

Louis looks confused, initially. ‘That’s your reaction?’ he says. And then his expression changes, forming a mischievous smile. ‘Why Harold,’ he says, raising an eyebrow. ‘Did you just assume my sexuality?’

Harry groans, putting his face in his hands, feeling his cheeks burning. ‘Please just forget I said anything, I’m sorry.’

Harry can hear Louis laughing softly. ‘It’s okay Harry. Don’t be sorry, I was just surprised, that’s all, please look at me.’

Harry looks up, into Louis’ kind smile. ‘If you must know,’ he continues. ‘That song is about a lovely person who identifies as non-binary, and uses all pronouns depending on the situation.’

And, wow. Harry is immediately intrigued, and has so many questions, because this is a topic he can relate to and is genuinely interested in. But luckily, before he can start bombarding the poor man with questions about an ex he probably doesn’t want to talk about, Ariel's cries start to sound from the baby monitor. Louis places his laptop on the coffee table.

‘Be right back,’ he says, as he heads to his room. Harry uses the time alone to pack away his own laptop, putting it back in his bag. He can hear Louis talking to Ariel on the baby monitor, calling her beautiful girl and chattering away to her as he presumably changes her nappy. The negative thoughts in his head immediately rise up again, comparing in his head his own manner with Ariel to Louis’. He realises somewhat belatedly that she’ll be wanting a bottle and he should have been making one rather than stewing in his own thoughts of how bad of a parent he is, which only serves to fuel more fire to those thoughts as he heads to the kitchen. He angrily washes his hands and starts filling a large pot of water to sterilise the bottles. He chucks three bottles and their various components into the water, turning on the hob and putting the lid on so it boils. He’s doing three so she’ll have one for now, one for the evening, and one for the middle of the night.

‘Hey,’ Louis says, his calm voice interrupting the storm of Harry’s thoughts. He looks up at Louis, who has his daughter snuggled into his shoulder. ‘Thank you for doing that.’

‘S’okay.’ Harry replies, turning back to his task. It’s been a few minutes and the water is coming to a boil, but he has to let it boil for a few minutes before taking everything out. Luckily, Ariel seems content for now. ‘Um, Louis, it’s okay if you don’t want to talk about them, but I’m, like, super curious about your ex you just mentioned, the one you wrote the song about.’

‘It’s okay. I thought you might be curious, we can talk about them.’ He chuckles slightly. ‘God, it’s probably the only functional relationship I’ve ever had. They’re nice memories.’

‘Okay, good,’ Harry agrees. ‘Is the water in the kettle already boiled?’ he says, turning back around to face Louis now that he has nothing to do but wait for the bottles to sterilise.

Louis nods. ‘I put fresh water in it when we got home and boiled it.’

Of course he did. The savage thought scrolls across Harry’s brain. Because he’s a better parent than you, you didn’t even think to do that. Harry shakes his head, as if the physical action will tip the negative thoughts out of his head. What were they talking about? Right, Louis’ non-binary ex. He forces himself to focus on the conversation, because he is actually genuinely interested

‘So, like, I’m curious as to how you know when to use which pronouns. Like, we’ve been using them to talk about them now, in this conversation. But in the song, you used her.’

Louis shrugs. ‘Like I said, it depends on the situation. I’m using they/them pronouns while we talk now because I haven’t seen them in a long time, and I’m not sure if they’re presenting as feminine, or masculine, or somewhere in between. But when I wrote the song, she was presenting as feminine most of the time, and generally preferred she/her pronouns.’

Harry is fascinated. ‘Most of the time? Didn’t that get confusing?’

‘Not really,’ Louis replies. ‘When you think about it, you don’t use pronouns when you’re talking directly to someone, it’s only when you’re talking about someone, or introducing them, that you use them. Or, if you’re thinking about the person in your head. So I’d normally just use what felt most appropriate at the time, depending on how they were presenting. Honestly, I’d just ask if I wasn’t sure. And of course, using they and them was always a good option if they were, you know, dressed pretty androgynous, or with both masculine and feminine elements.’

Harry thinks about this. He wants to play with his rings, but he hadn’t put them on today. ‘What do you use then, when you’re talking or thinking about me?’

Louis opens his mouth in a small ‘o’ before he replies. ‘That is a very good question, Harold and I’m very afraid I’m about to say the wrong answer.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ he says, and he can see Louis is about to protest and say that it does matter, so he presses on. ‘What I mean, is that I prefer not to label myself, in terms of sexuality or, like, gender as well I guess? So it doesn’t matter what you’ve been using.’

Now it is Louis' turn to look surprised ‘You don’t label your gender?’

Harry shakes his head. ‘Nope. That’s why I don’t mind what pronouns people use. Because they all feel right to me.’

‘Well,’ says Louis. ‘That is both fascinating and a relief, because I’ve been using he and him for you.’

Harry nods. ‘That’s what most people use. I’m comfortable with them. I mean, I used to identify only as male, before I realised that wasn’t the only option. And I guess I present mostly masculine? I don’t know. I think you just haven’t seen most of my more girly clothing yet. And I normally have painted nails, but it’s a bit hard to get around to that sort of thing with a newborn.’ As he talks, he turns off the hob. It’s been boiling for long enough now, but he’ll let it cool a little before taking everything out.

‘Fair enough,’ Louis chuckles as Harry turns back around to face him. ‘So you said you don’t label your sexuality as well?’

‘Nope,’ Harry says. ‘None of the existing labels felt right to me, and I just decided in the end it wasn’t necessary.’

Louis is smiling. ‘You’re not going to believe this, because in my experience it’s a pretty uncommon thing, but I don’t label my sexuality either.’

Harry is shocked. ‘Stop!’ He says good naturedly. ‘Get out! I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone in real life that doesn’t label their sexuality!’

Louis laughs. ‘Me either. You were kind of right before, with your assumption. I love dick, so much. I actually used to identify as gay, when I was younger. But, as we both now know, gender doesn’t always align with genitals. So at some point, gay stopped feeling like the right label for me. And also, I’ve never actually slept with a person with a vagina, so there’s a bit of unexplored territory for me there as well, which also made it harder for me to decide on a label.’

Wow. Louis just keeps surprising Harry, over and over. He turns back to the pot, while he decides how to respond. He lifts the components out with clean tongs onto a paper towel. ‘Do you feel like,’ he says, as he works. ‘That no one else actually gets it?’

‘Oh my god, yes. So much. All the time!’ Louis exclaims with a sigh, and they both laugh as Harry pours the cooled boiled water from the kettle into one of the bottles, measuring out the powdered formula and adding it in. He assembles the teat and screw cap carefully, pulling the teat through the cap with the tongs so as not to ruin all his hard work sterilising.

‘So,’ he says, glad his back is to Louis for this question, because he can feel his cheeks already burning. ‘You’ve never had vaginal sex?’

‘Nope,’ Louis replies.

‘Do you want to?’ He asks, as he snaps the protective cap over the sanitised teat and screws the whole thing tightly onto the bottle and shaking it, turning back round to Louis. He looks thoughtful.

‘I don’t know,’ he considers, pausing to consider the question. Since Ariel likes her formula warm, Harry chucks the entire bottle into the cooling pot of previously boiled water on the stovetop while he waits for Louis’ response.

‘I think I tried to, once, when I was drunk. She was so sweet and put me in a cab and made sure I got home safe.’

Harry laughs. It feels so good. ‘Oh dear, Lou,’ he says, through his chuckles, turning back round to prepare the other bottles for later, repeating the same process as before.

‘I guess I have difficulty picturing, or imagining, rather, how it’s different from anal.’ Louis muses.

Harry considers this as he measures the formula into the bottles. He has had quite a prolific and varied sex life for someone of only twenty one years. ‘It’s good,’ he says, his back still turned to Louis as he works. ‘Like, I think, equally as good to topping when doing anal. It feels completely different, but it’s just as good. Only problem is, since I’m versatile, I miss bottoming when my partner doesn’t have the required, erm, equipment.’

‘Huh. Okay. I didn’t even consider that aspect.’ Louis replies.

‘Yeah,’ says Harry, as he turns around, shaking the remaining two bottles with one in each hand. ‘But that can be plenty made up for with toys, I have discovered.’ He smirks as he says this, looking Louis directly in the eye.

‘You kinky little devil you,’ says Louis teasingly, as Harry turns to put the finished bottles away, placing them at the back of the fridge where it’s coldest. Surely, he thinks, the bottle in the pot must be warm enough by now. He plucks it out and takes the cap off, squirting it onto his forearm to test the temperature.

‘It’s ready,’ he says, drying off his forearm with the paper towel. ‘D’ya wanna go sit on the couch?’
Louis nods, and they make their way over. Harry hands the bottle to Louis once he is settled with Ariel.

‘Thanks,’ Louis replies as he begins to feed the baby. ‘So, erm, we kind of got distracted from the song, a bit.’

‘Oh!’ Says Harry. ‘Yeah, I really loved it. And I think the tempo is what they’re looking for, the lyrics as well hopefully.’

Louis smiles. ‘Good. You can have it then.’

Harry hesitates, because it’s a good song, and he really wants it, but at the same time he wants to make sure Louis is okay with it. ‘Are you sure? It’s really good, are you sure you don’t want to keep it for yourself?’

Louis shakes his head. ‘Nah. Also, I kind of like the idea that maybe people will get to hear it.’

‘Okay,’ Harry agrees. ‘Can you email the demo to me later? I’ll send it off to my team and see if they like it.’

‘Yeah, of course.’ Louis replies. There is a bit of a lull in the conversation, and without any distractions Harry is not so nicely reminded that he still feels fucking awful. It has been so nice, talking with Louis about things he’s interested in and things they have in common. And Louis seems more comfortable around him too, which is good.

‘I still feel like shit,’ he blurts out. ‘But the talking has been helping, thank you.’

Louis smiles warmly at him, the corners of his blue eyes crinkling. His hair is in a fringe today, like when they first met all those years ago.

‘I’m glad,’ he replies. He pauses, frowning a little in concentration. ‘Have you, erm – just tell me to shut up if you don’t want to talk about this, by the way – but have you had anything like this happen before, like depression, or anxiety in the past?’

Harry shakes his head. ‘Nothing like this. I get performance anxiety, sometimes, but this is different.’

‘Okay.’ Louis breathes, and he looks sad. ‘Then I’ll tell you this – it's not going to get better straight away, but it will get better, okay? Just remember that.’

Harry forces himself to make dinner that night, because Louis is busy with Ariel and he needs the distraction. He stares at the contents of Louis’ packed fridge. There is more food in the fridge than what he’d just bought, the fridge must have been already stocked. He’s struggling to remember what he’d thrown into his trolley earlier that day. He wanders into the bathroom, where Louis is bathing Ariel. He supposes he should be helping with the bath, but he can’t quite bring himself to care. The thought frightens him once he actually picks it up, and turns it over to examine it. He shoves it away, trying desperately not to think at all.

‘Harry? D’you need something?’ comes Louis’ voice. Harry starts, and realises he has been standing silently in the door of the bathroom.

‘Erm,’ he says, struggling to remember what he was going to ask. ‘Can I use anything in the fridge? Or is some stuff for certain things you’re planning to make?’

Louis doesn’t turn around, since he is focused on his task, but he laughs. ‘Oh god no. I’m not that organised. Help yourself to anything.’

Harry nods, then realises Louis can’t see him. ‘Okay, thanks.’ He wanders back to the kitchen and starts pulling things mostly at random out of the fridge. He settles on pumpkin and feta pizza, preparing and assembling the ingredients while listening to Ariel scream from another room. Once he gets it in the oven, she’s still screaming. He sighs reluctantly and heads toward the sound, to see if Louis needs help. He peeks into Louis’ room as the door is ajar, and is greeted by the sight of Louis removing his soaked shirt. He blinks, not having been mentally prepared for the sight of a shirtless Louis. He’s gorgeous, and the thought starts a spiral of confusing emotions in his head.

‘Oh hey,’ Louis says as he looks up, discarding his shirt on the floor, looking stressed. ‘Sorry for the noise, she’s just really unsettled.’

‘S’okay,’ Harry says, as Louis rummages in a laundry basket. He steps into the room. Ariel is in Louis’ cot, which is positioned next to his bed. He reaches in and picks her up, holding her against his chest. She doesn’t stop crying though.

‘Fair warning, I’m about to strip, and I think we’re not quite at that stage of our friendship yet,’ Louis says as he pulls clothes out of the laundry basket. Harry belatedly notices that Louis trousers are also wet.

‘Sorry,’ he says as he turns around, his cheeks heating.

‘Don’t be sorry, thanks for picking her up.’

‘Doesn’t seem to have made much difference, she’s still crying,’ Harry says, his back still to the room.

‘She’s fine.’ Louis says. ‘She doesn’t need anything, she’s just fussing for no reason. Babies just do that sometimes.’

Harry feels a tap on his shoulder and jumps a little, turning around to find a now fully clothed Louis, dressed in soft gray track pants and a t-shirt.

‘Sorry,’ Louis says, looking concerned. ‘I didn’t mean to startle you.’

Harry shakes his head. ‘It’s not your fault. I’m just still really anxious and it’s making me jumpy.’

‘That’s understandable,’ Louis replies, looking sympathetic. ‘Here I can take her for a bit, if you want?’

Harry nods and transfers the squirming baby to Louis’ shoulder. Louis walks out of the room and Harry follows, watching Louis walk circles around the living room, patting Ariel’s back.

‘I think she doesn’t like it when she gets cold getting out of the bath,’ he says to Harry, his voice raised a little to be heard over the crying. ‘And then she got annoyed again when I put her in the cot so I could get changed.’

Harry nods and goes to sit on the couch. ‘It really frustrates me when she cries when she shouldn’t need anything. It makes me worry that there’s something wrong, like she’s sick or something.’

‘Sometimes it could mean she’s sick, you’re right. But I’m pretty sure she’s fine at the moment. Remember, crying is the only way for her to communicate. Maybe she’s just trying to tell us a story.’ Louis laughs. ‘Like, maybe she’s saying ‘oh my god dad, Louis was giving me a nice warm bath and then I was cold! And then he put me in the cot when I’m not tired!’’ he laughs again as he comes to join Harry on the couch, sitting down carefully holding the squirming baby. ‘Here, see if she wants you again. She knows you better. I can take her back if she doesn’t settle.’

Harry nods, and takes her. At first, she’s still wiggling, and crying, but then Harry notices the cries are finally becoming softer, becoming just tiny whimpers as she relaxes in Harry’s arms. Harry looks up at Louis, smiling in relief.

‘See?’ Louis grins. ‘She was just mad at me. Little drama queen.’ He smiles fondly and reaches over to pat her head. As he does, Harry’s phone beeps from where he’d left it on the kitchen counter.

‘Oh, that’s the timer for the pizza,’ he remembers.

‘I’ll get it,’ Louis says, getting up from the couch and walking over to the kitchen. ‘Okay if I shut the timer off on your phone?’ he calls.

‘Yep!’ Harry replies, pleased that Louis had thought to ask if he could touch his phone. He was just so respectful in so many ways. ‘Is it done?’ He calls, hearing the oven door close.

‘Dunno,’ says Louis. ‘Come have a look.’

Harry stands carefully with Ariel and pads to the kitchen in his socked feet, coming to stand on the opposite side of the counter to Louis. The pizza looks good, the crust browned.

‘It’s done,’ he informs Louis. ‘I wanted to put a little aioli and rocket on top, if you want to do?’

Louis raises an eyebrow at him. ‘Harry, this pizza already has entirely too many vegetables on it and you want to add more?’

‘It has one vegetable,’ Harry insists, stroking the back of Ariel’s head. ‘The pumpkin.’

‘Exactly,’ Louis replies. ‘One too many.’

‘I thought you wanted something healthy!’ Harry says indignantly.

‘I changed my mind,’ Louis says, but he is smiling at Harry, looking fond. ‘Alright, we’ll do it your way,’ he continues, turning around to open the fridge, getting out the ingredients Harry requested.

‘Hold the sauce up high, and like, squeeze it out over the pizza in lines, so it looks pretty,’ Harry says when Louis returns.

Louis stares at him. ‘Aren’t we just going to cover it with rocket anyway? Why does it matter?’

Louis does kind of have a point, but still. ‘You’ll probably still be able to see some of it?’ he says weakly, the words coming out more like a question than a statement.

Louis grins wickedly at him, making eye contact. ‘Sit down,’ he says, pointing to the stool next to Harry, pushed into the bench he is standing in front of.

‘Why?’ Harry asks.

‘Because I’m hoping to make you laugh, and you’re holding a baby. Now sit.’

Harry obeys, adjusting his hold on Ariel so that she is supported by just one of his hands, pulling out the stool with the other and sitting down. He watches, in part horror, part fascination, as Louis proceeds to draw a dick on his beautiful pizza with the aioli.

‘Louis!’ He says, trying to sound indignant, annoyed, but it’s impossible, because laughter is bubbling up inside him, and it’s such a good feeling.

‘What?’ says Louis. ‘The aioli is on the pizza, is it not?

Harry wipes away actual tears that had sprung to his eyes with his free hand, keeping a firm hold on Ariel with the other. She’s squirming again, not liking the loud noise and the fact that he’s moving about so much. ‘But Louis,’ he gasps out, once he is finally able to speak. ‘It’s not evenly distributed. See, whoever gets that slice will get no sauce at all.’

Louis looks down at the area Harry had indicated. ‘Hmmm, you’re right. I can fix that.’ He says. He picks up the sauce bottle again, and proceeds to draw lines on the pizza, starting from the tip of the dick and extending out onto the bare areas of the pizza.

Harry can only presume they are supposed to be semen, and god it’s so gross but it’s so funny. He’s laughing again, it’s bubbling up and spreading like a balm over his anxiety and ugly thoughts. ‘Oh god,’ he says, gasping for air. ‘Louis put the rocket on right now, I can’t look at it.’

Louis obeys, sprinkling the leaves over the pizza until the crude design is hidden. Harry stands up, rocking a little to try to soothe Ariel, who had started to cry again with all the commotion. She quietens down just as Louis finishes cutting up the pizza and puts it on plates for them. Louis slides them over and comes round to the other side of the counter to join Harry.

‘Thanks,’ he says quietly when he is once more face-to-face with Louis. ‘I needed that.’

‘Anytime darling,’ Harry notices that Louis’ hand twitches as he says this, like he wanted to move it but decided against it. ‘Do you wanna put her down while we eat? She should be fine.’

Harry shakes his head. ‘It’s okay. I can hold her with one hand and eat with the other. She still seems unsettled, I’m worried if I put her down she’ll cry and then one of us will just have to get up again.’

Louis nods and pulls out his chair to sit down. ‘Fair enough. I think it must be easier for you to hold her like that than it is for me, your hands are bigger than mine. I mean, I can hold her like that, but it’s not comfortable.’

Harry considers Louis’ hands as he sits back in his chair. He supposes, objectively, they are a bit smaller than his own, but they don’t really look small, they’re just in proportion with the rest of him. The prominent knuckles and wide fingernails bitten short serve to make his slim fingers look masculine. He quickly picks up a slice of pizza with his free hand after he realises he’s been staring for a beat too long.

‘What’s the cheese?’ Louis asks, with his mouth full.

‘Feta,’ Harry replies, after he swallows his bite. The pizza is good, a nice mix of freshness with the rich cheese and sauce.

‘Huh,’ replies Louis. ‘You know, this is actually not bad Harold.’

‘You doubted me?’ Harry asks, in mock outrage.

‘I didn’t doubt you could cook,’ Louis replies. ‘I just doubted I would like it.’

Harry laughs, and finishes his slice, as they eat in companionable silence.

Chapter Text

Louis takes Ariel after they finish their meal while Harry washes up. The day seems to be dragging on forever, it’s still slightly too early to feed Ariel her next bottle and put her down for bed. So, after the dishes are done, they lie on the floor with their heads together, their bodies angled out slightly so they can tuck Ariel in the middle, between them.

‘You’ll have to show me your girly clothes,’ Louis says. ‘When we’re back at yours.’

Warmth floods in Harry’s chest as he stares at the ceiling. ‘I will.’

‘We should do your nails too. That would have been nice to do tonight, but I don’t have any nail polish.’

‘I don’t either,’ Harry says, remembering. ‘I threw them all out.’ That had been a bad day. It had been not even a week after Ariel had been born, and his mum had been staying with him but she had been due to leave soon. He’d opened a drawer in the bathroom to look for a hair tie and it was just everywhere. All their stuff, makeup, nail polish, and hair products shoved haphazardly into the drawers. He knew he’d picked out some of the products, but at the end of the day they had shared all of them, and he’d been angry, so angry. He’d tossed it all, some of the bottles and compacts breaking as he threw them forcefully into a garbage bag.

‘Oh Harry,’ Louis says sadly. ‘We can get you some new ones, okay?’

‘Yeah,’ Harry says. ‘That would be nice.’ Harry is just glad he hadn’t had to do the same thing with the clothes. They’d had pretty different styles, and while occasionally one would borrow something from the other's wardrobe, for the most part, their clothes were their own. He’d picked out all his clothes, including his feminine clothing, just for him.

‘Did you get in?’ Louis asks.

‘Huh?’ Harry replies, not sure what Louis is talking about. ‘In where?’

‘After boot camp, on the X Factor. Did you make it further than that? I didn’t watch the show, I was too annoyed about not getting in.’

‘Oh!’ Harry says, understanding. ‘Yeah, I went to the judges' houses but didn’t make it to the live shows. I had some friends I made on the show who did though, I’m still in contact with a lot of them.’

‘That’s cool. But I guess it doesn’t matter now right, I mean, you’re doing what you want to do now, it just took a little longer to get there.’

‘Yeah, that’s true.’ Harry muses. He wants to change the subject, he doesn’t really want to talk about work right now. What he really wants to do is ask Louis about what he’s been through, or what he’s going through. If Louis doesn’t want to let him in any more than he already has, that’s fine, he’ll respect that. But he thinks that if he hears someone else’s story, it will help him feel less alone right now.

‘Lou,’ he says, a little hesitantly. ‘Are you okay? You said something earlier today that worried me.’

‘Huh?’ He replies. ‘What did I say that worried you?

‘It was two things, actually,’ Harry replies, just now remembering the other occurrence. ‘When you were trying to distract me this morning, you said you’d been through a hard time a few years ago. And then, when we were – when I brought up us, you said that we shouldn’t just wait for me, we should wait for you as well because you’re dealing with some things that you think you should have gotten professional help for, but haven’t.’

Louis is quiet for a while, and Harry is just about to interject and tell him he doesn’t have to talk if he’s not comfortable, when he hears the other man sigh.

‘And I suppose you’re wondering about the scars, as well?’

‘Yeah,’ Harry says in a small voice. He hasn’t let himself think too much about the scars yet, not today at least, for fear it will destabilise him completely. He’d noticed them on the first day he’d met Louis of course – most of the scars were faded and barely noticeable, but unfortunately for Louis there were a few that were more obvious and pretty hard to miss. And at the time, in some warped kind of way, noticing them had made him feel a kind of kinship toward the man, like he might understand Harry’s struggles better than someone who’d had an easier life. And then, once he’d read Louis texts after his show, he was both elated and devastated. Elated because Louis was his blue-eyed boy, and devastated because he wasn’t, at the same time. Louis wasn’t the same bright, bubbly teenager he’d met at X Factor. This Louis had been through things that had caused a slightly harder set to his jaw, a painful flicker in his eyes, and for the skin on his arm to be broken open, time and time again. He’d cried himself to sleep that night.

‘I don’t cut anymore,’ Louis' voice breaks through the silence, sounding loud in the stillness of the room. ‘You - you don’t need to worry about that. The scars are from about three years ago. I had severe depression, and it took a while to find the right kind of treatment and medication that worked for me.’

And yeah, as Harry takes this in, it is a bit of a relief, for about two seconds. Until Harry’s mind starts going into overdrive thinking into all the possibilities of what Louis could be going through currently, if it’s not that.

‘Okay then – so something else happened then, more recently?’

‘Yeah,’ Louis sighs. ‘Look, I’m happy to talk about it – well actually, no, there are some parts I don’t think I’m ready to talk about yet, but I can tell you the rest. That aside though, are you sure you want to? It’s been a rough day for you Haz. I don’t want to make your mood worse.’

Harry considers this. ‘I want to talk about it,’ he decides. ‘I think, if I have a better idea of what’s going on with you, I’ll be less worried. Also, I think it will help me feel less alone.’

He hears Louis sigh softly beside him. ‘Okay then. So, about, maybe like two years ago or so I got into a new relationship with this guy named Kale. I was in, like, such a good place at the time. I was working part time at the daycare and working on music on the side, mainly song writing, I did a few small pub gigs as well. It was really fun, I was pretty broke but I was happy. The relationship started out great, like even looking back I can’t pinpoint any real red flags until about six months in? That was when he started to get annoyed at my schedule, and my finances. Like, if I couldn’t go to a fancy club with him on the weekend because I had a gig, or I couldn’t afford it. Stuff like that. Eventually, at some point, I asked for extra shifts at the daycare, and when another employee wanted to drop two of her days, I took them.’

‘Is that what you wanted to do?’ Harry asks, glancing over to look at Louis. His profile looks so delicate, highlighted by the late afternoon sun seeping in through the window. Louis’ jaw twitches as he considers his answer.

‘No.’ He says. ‘I think, at the time, I convinced myself I was doing it for me. But I wasn’t. It was his constant nagging, going on and on about how he thought it would be the best thing for me. To be fair, I was sick of being broke, that was something I wanted to change. But there could have been a way to earn more money without having to give up music altogether, you know? Like, I could have gotten a job like this, maybe, instead of the daycare, and used the downtime to write. Or I could have thought longer term, maybe done some more study, y’know, be a preschool teacher or even a different career altogether. I don’t know. The point is, I didn’t consider those options because my vision was so tunnelled, I could only see Kale’s option. I loved him, and that’s what he thought was best for me, so that’s what I did.’

‘So, you gave up music altogether?’ Harry asks quietly, staring up at the ceiling.

‘Yeah,’ Louis says. ‘I didn’t have any time to write or rehearse with the extra shifts, and I was too exhausted after work to do any Friday night gigs. I did gigs still on Saturdays, for a bit, when they came up, but, well Kale didn’t like that.’

‘He didn’t?’ Harry was really starting to dislike this guy.

‘Nope. I’d spend most of Saturday rehearsing, and then the gig at night, no time to spend with him.’

‘But that’s just one day, what, like every couple of weeks, every month or something right? Surely that left you plenty of time to spend with him?’

Louis laughs hollowly. ‘You’d think. I mean, we had very similar work hours, Monday to Friday, he finished a little later than me most days, but still, that left plenty of time in the evening. But no, we rarely hung out on weeknights. We didn’t live together, for one – that's another thing. I was quite keen to move in together, I thought it would be great for our finances and to be able to spend more time together. But he insisted he didn’t want to live together. He didn’t even like me staying over when I had work the next day, because back then I was normally the one opening the centre for the day. I had to get up super early, and he would get annoyed about being woken by my alarm and said he could never get back to sleep. So, I only stayed over on Fridays and Saturdays. And he never came here, either, because I was living with my friend Niall at the time, and he didn’t like Niall. Which, like, what the fuck? Everyone likes Niall. Even at the time I thought that was super weird. But I couldn’t see all the other red flags, I couldn’t see the manipulation, and all his other flaws while I was living through it. Which you’re going to think is dumb of me, but that’s the truth.’

Harry considers this. ‘I don’t think you were being dumb,’ he says gently. ‘I think you were just in love.’

‘I was. Head over heels. I would have done anything for him, and I literally did. I stopped doing the Saturday gigs so we could spend more time together on the weekends. And then – it gets worse, Harry, are you sure you want me to keep going?’

‘Yeah,’ Harry says, reaching down to stroke Ariel’s hair. ‘Keep going, if you’re comfortable, that is. I’ll let you know if it gets too upsetting.’

‘Okay. This whole time, I’d been seeing a psychologist, the same one I’d been seeing for years. The visits were pretty infrequent, by that point, but I was still seeing her. On our last appointment, she told me she was moving to Ireland, and gave me a list of trusted colleagues that would be able to take me on as a patient. I mentioned it to Kale when I got home, and he said I shouldn't bother finding another doctor.’

Harry hears his own sharp, involuntary inhale of breath. ‘What?’

‘I know.’ Louis says. ‘Like, I’d been straight up with him from the start. I told him I had depression and anxiety on our first date. But I don’t think he ever really got it, because, for the most part, up until then, I had been in a pretty good place, mentally, for the time he’d known me. He said I seemed fine, and didn’t need to waste money on a psychologist. So, I left it be, and didn’t look up any of the doctors. Now that, that’s bad enough in itself, I’m fully aware of that now. But still to this day, I still can’t quite believe I actually did this next part I’m about to tell you.’

‘What did you do?’ Harry asks quietly, his own anxiety spiking a little at Louis’ words.

‘I was on medication for my depression. I was prescribed it during the time I was self-harming, and had been taking it ever since. I was running out, and I was wondering aloud if I could get the prescription refilled by a normal doctor, since I wasn’t seeing a psychologist anymore. He said I shouldn’t bother, that I didn’t need the medication and would be fine without it.’

‘Oh no,’ Harry says sadly, turning his head to look at Louis, who already has his head tilted, looking at Harry. ‘Louis, you didn’t.’

‘I did,’ he confirms, squeezing his eyes shut for a second. ‘I stopped taking it. Now, before you think I’m the biggest, dumbest idiot ever, I have a theory as to why.’

‘Okay, what is it?’

‘I think – I think at that point, my mental health might have already been declining, but of course it wasn’t picked up since I wasn’t seeing a psychologist anymore. Because that’s not the action of a rational person. I also think that, by this point, I had become so – what’s the word - ‘conditioned’, maybe – by the manipulation that I just went along with whatever he said. I don’t know, honestly. But it happened.’

Harry looks back up to the ceiling, trying to digest everything. He is a little furious at Louis, because whatever he says, it was still a dumb thing to do. Reckless, even. But mostly he just feels overwhelmingly sad for Louis, that he’d even been in that situation, in that toxic relationship, in the first place. He’s also angry, angry at that fucker Kale. Louis deserves to be showered with kindness, not manipulated into changing his career and dropping his therapy and meds. God knows what else the bastard has done that Louis’ leaving out, or even worse - doesn’t even realise was bad.

‘How long ago was that?’ he asks.

‘About a year ago.’ Louis replies. ‘I think – I don’t think I want to go into too much detail with what happened next, sorry. I’m still coming to terms with some things that happened, and this has been pretty difficult to talk about already, to be honest.’

‘It’s okay,’ Harry replies, reaching across Ariel to lightly stroke Louis’ arm, some small token of comfort. ‘Whatever you’re comfortable with.’

‘Okay,’ Louis says, taking a deep breath. ‘So basically, about four or five months after I’d stopped taking the meds, I was in an absolutely awful place, mental health wise, to the point where it was affecting my work, and I ended up almost losing my job.’

‘Shit,’ Harry breathes.

‘When that happened – it was kind of like – a bit of a wake up call, I guess? I could finally see how wrong some of Kale’s behaviours were, that he didn’t treat me well at all. I realised that the downward spiral of my mental health stemmed from those emotionally manipulative behaviours. I broke up with him that very day, got all my shit out of his flat.’

‘That was very brave,’ Harry says.

‘Was it?’ Louis laughs, a little desperately. ‘Anyway, after that I sort of – got myself to a kind of place where I was barely functional, the bare minimum, so that I could do my job and that’s it. I honestly still don’t know how I even managed to do that. Niall had moved out a while before that, before I stopped the therapy so I was on my own. I was drinking too much, and forgot or didn’t have the energy for basic tasks outside of work. And that has basically been my holding pattern for the last six months, until now.’

‘Oh Lou,’ Harry says, sadness filling him. ‘I’m so sorry.’ They’re both silent for a few beats, until Harry speaks again. ‘What changed?’

‘I have a friend who helped me through the worst of it, Zayn. He used to work with me in my room at the daycare. I know he was extremely worried about me, still is. He kept encouraging me to go and see someone, to talk about what had happened, to help me get to a better place, mentally. But I just couldn’t do it. It was too overwhelming, at that time, to even think about. I was embarrassed, and ashamed about everything that had happened. I still am, really. But yeah, after a few months, Zayn quit the daycare. He said at the time he wasn’t sure if it was the career for him, and he wanted to do an art course. But I can’t help but think maybe it was because of me.’

‘You don’t know that though. He could have really just wanted to change his career.’ Harry says, trying to be positive.

‘Perhaps. But anyway, our friendship had become very strained. Not seeing each other as frequently after he quit did seem to help a little though. Anyway, I was having a good day, and I thought about texting to tell him that, but then I stopped because I was worried he’d bring up the therapy thing again. And then I started thinking about why he keeps bringing it up so much, and it all just sort of clicked. I think enough time had passed by then that I was able to think about it more logically, and it helped that I was in a good head space at the time too.’

‘When was that?’ Harry asks.

‘Um, the day I met you, actually,’ Louis replies.

Harry’s so surprised by this that he sits up. He’d been thinking, from the way Louis had been talking and also just by how together he seems, that his revelation had been maybe a few weeks ago.

‘What? That was just a couple of days ago!’ He exclaims, looking down at Louis.

‘Yeah,’ he replies, looking up at Harry and clasping his hands together to rest on his stomach. ‘It’s a bit fresh. That’s why I didn’t want to talk about some stuff.’

‘Oh god it’s fine,’ Harry replies, shaking his head. ‘I just – can I give you a hug? I want to hug you.’

Louis laughs lightly as he sits up and scoots back a little, moving so that he’s closer to Harry and the baby is no longer between them. ‘Sure, Haz,’ he replies, a hesitant smile on his face. His eyes are sad. Harry embraces him, holding him tight. He’s warm, and small, and soft all at the same time.

‘We’ll be alright, Lou,’ Harry says into his ear. ‘We’ll be alright, because I can’t bear to consider anything else.’

Chapter Text

‘Lou?’ Louis can barely hear Harry’s soft voice over Ariel’s screams. He holds her one handed as he swirls the bottle in the warm water again, frustrated.

‘Sorry, Harry. Go back to bed. She’s fine, just hungry. She barely drank any of her bottle when she woke up earlier.’

Louis feels a warm presence beside him as Harry comes to stand next to him at the bench. ‘Let me take her for a sec.’

Louis scrunches his eyes shut. He is so, so, tired. ‘Are you okay to? Just for a bit?’

‘Yep, come on.’ He reaches for the baby, prising her off Louis’ chest with his big hands.

Louis continues aggressively swirling the bottle in the warm water for something to do. ‘I wish she liked cold formula. Such a little princess.’

Harry laughs. ‘Gotta be just right for this little one.’

Louis notes with supreme annoyance that Ariel’s cries have subsided into a quiet whimper now Harry has her. ‘Of course she stops crying for you.’ He looks over at Harry then, and wishes he hadn’t said it quite so aggressively. Harry is smiling and actually looks quite endeared that Ariel is settling for him. ‘Sorry.’ he tacks on, lamely.

Harry looks up at him, still smiling.’It’s okay Lou. I get it. You’re stressed, see, she could sense it when you were holding her.’

Louis breathes out slowly and closes his eyes, trying to calm himself. He can feel a headache coming on. ‘You’re right, sorry, she’s just been super fussy tonight.’ He starts a little as he feels a hand covering his, stilling his wrist that had been anxiously manipulating the bottle in the water. His eyes fly open. Harry’s green eyes are staring right into his.

‘Do you want to see if it’s ready?’ He asks. Ariel is quiet now, Harry has her tucked to his chest with the hand not currently covering Louis’s own.

Louis’ throat is dry, and the calmness he’d been trying to force upon himself has been wiped away by the warmth of Harry’s skin on his, and the prickling sensation in his veins of feeling something, some emotion that’s not ugly and self destructive. He’s too tired for this shit. ‘Yeah, sure,’ he croaks out. The loss of skin contact as he pulls the bottle from the water is embarrassingly painful, and he quickly breaks eye contact with Harry as he squirts some of the formula onto his inner forearm to check the temperature. ‘It’s fine,’ he says, quickly placing the bottle down on the bench before turning to grab some paper towel to wipe his arm. When he turns back, he sees that Harry has already shifted Ariel to the crook of his elbow and has started to feed her.

‘I’ve got her, Lou,’ Harry says, comfortingly. ‘You get some more sleep.’

Louis wants to argue, because like he feels he’s shirking his responsibilities, and he doesn’t want to overburden Harry. But Harry has offered, and Louis is exhausted. So he doesn’t. He simply grabs some painkillers from the cupboard and a water bottle from the fridge, muttering a quiet ‘Thank you,’ to Harry as he leaves for his room, locking eyes with him once more before turning to go.

When Louis wakes the sun is coming in through the gap in his curtains, and he feels a lot better than he did at whatever ungodly hour it had been when Ariel had finally decided she wanted to eat. He prods gingerly at his emotions as he lays there, trying to figure out how kind his brain is going to be to him today. He is feeling a lack of confidence after last night, which is stirring up self destructive thoughts. He sighs. He’s just going to have to muddle through and get through the day as best he can, and try to be kind to himself.

He forces himself out of bed and into the living room, taking note that Ariel is lying calmly on her rug. Harry’s in the kitchen, leaning over and peering into the fridge.

‘Hi,’ Louis says, as he comes up behind him.

‘’Hi!’ Harry replies, not turning around. ‘Can I use these eggs?’

‘Go for it.’

Harry extracts said eggs, as well as some butter from the fridge. ‘Do you have real butter?’ He asks as he turns around, squinting at the label of the tub in his hand.

‘No.’

‘You should cook with real butter. This is shit.’ he says, as he places the ingredients on the counter.

‘Hey now, that shit tastes just fine on toast and has way less calories than real butter. I stand by my choices.’

Harry laughs. ‘I shall reserve judgement until I taste it then. Want some scrambled eggs? That’s what I’m making.’

‘Sure. Can I help?’

‘You can start by finding me a mixing bowl and a whisk, I haven’t quite figured out where everything is in your kitchen yet.’

Louis retrieves the bowl and then pauses to stare at his utensil drawer. He’s not actually sure he owns a whisk. Most of his kitchen things have been given to him by well meaning family members, hoping he will use them more often than he actually does. He rummages in the drawer, but no whisk magically appears.

‘I don’t have a whisk,’ he calls out to Harry.

‘A fork, then.’ Harry replies. Louis retrieves one and heads back over to the bench where Harry is standing, placing the items down in front of him. ‘How many eggs do you want?’ Continues Harry.

‘One, please.’ Louis replies. He looks at Harry as he cracks the eggs into the bowl, an adorable look of concentration on his face. He’s still wearing what he wore to bed the night before, a simple gray t-shirt and black track pants. His hair is soft and fluffy looking from the wash Harry gave it the night before, curling messily against his cheek. Once the eggs are in the bowl, Harry picks up the fork and begins to mix the eggs in the bowl in a strange fashion, like the fork is making little circles, skipping up and out of the mixture. ‘Is that whisking?’ He asks curiously.

‘What?’ says Harry, not looking up.

‘What are you doing? Are you whisking the eggs?’

‘Yes of course I’m whisking the eggs Louis. Are you being serious right now?’ Harry looks over to him quickly, an amused look on his face, before directing his attention back to his task.

‘Yes, I’m being serious. I told you I’m shit at cooking.’

Harry laughs. ‘One, how are you real. Two, you said yesterday you make omelettes. How the fuck do you make an omelette without whisking?

Louis thinks. ‘The yolks normally break up when I crack the eggs or when I dump all the other stuff in, I normally put, like, veggies and ham. Then I just mix everything together with a spoon.’

‘No offence Louis, but I’m kind of horrified by that description you just gave. I was going to let you try whisking but I’m scared now.’

‘Hey!’ Louis pouts. ‘Let me try.’

‘Okay, okay,’ Harry laughs and holds up his hands, stepping back from the bench in acquiescence. Louis shuffles over and picks up the fork. He tries to copy the motion Harry had been doing, but it feels clumsy and slow.

‘Am I doing it right?’

He feels a warmth at his back as Harry steps up to peer over his shoulder. ‘Erm, doing great babe.’

Even though he knows Harry’s praise is false from the tone in his voice, Louis nearly drops the fork at the pet name. He knows it probably doesn’t really mean anything, like when he calls people love, but still. He likes how it sounds on Harry’s lips. Babe.

‘I know you’re lying, but I appreciate it all the same,’ he replies as he finally gives up on his attempt at whisking, stepping away from the bowl to let Harry return to his previous position.

‘I was trying to boost your confidence!’ Harry says, exasperated.

‘I know, and I appreciate it. Thank you.’

Harry sighs. ‘I will continue to try. Now, have you made scrambled eggs before?’

Louis replies that he hasn’t, and watches as Harry puts a little butter and the whisked eggs into a small saucepan, before turning on the hob to a low heat. He stirs the mixture, explaining to Louis that it’s important not to preheat the pan, otherwise the eggs can cook too fast. A few minutes pass where Louis can see absolutely no change to the mixture, then, suddenly, it all comes together quite quickly, Harry stirring constantly as it seems to change from raw eggs to scrambled eggs like magic.

‘Quick, get me a plate.’ says Harry, and Louis quickly moves to grab one and place it next to the stove. Harry dumps the eggs onto it, scraping them all out of the pot before placing it back down and turning off the hob. ‘We should eat them soon while they’re hot, but do you have any bread? They’re good with toast.’

Louis replies that yes, he does have bread and produces a loaf of sliced grainy bread from his freezer.

‘D’you want two pieces, since you have two eggs? They’re small slices.’ Louis informs Harry as he opens the loaf. Harry replies that yes, two sounds good, after looking at the size of the slice. Louis toasts and butters the bread for them as Harry dishes out Louis’ portion of the eggs onto a separate plate, and seasons the eggs with salt and pepper.

As they take their plates to sit at the tiny little table in the corner of Louis’ living room, he is pleased to see that Ariel is still very content. ‘She’s being so good,’ he says as they sit down.

Harry nods. ‘She really is very good, most of the time. We’re lucky.’

Again, Louis knows it doesn’t really mean anything but his heart warms a little at Harry’s use of ‘we’re’, referring to them as a team, a unit. The positive feeling helps as he starts his meal.

‘How is it?’ Harry prompts, after Louis has tasted the food.

‘Really good,’ Louis replies, honestly. It really does help, on days like today, when eating is hard, if the food is actually good.

‘Whoo!’ Harry says as he spoons some eggs onto his toast. ‘I’m glad.’

Harry chatters on for a bit about how he’s going to get to his appointment because there’s no parking so he can’t drive. He’s going on about which bus he should take from Louis’ and then changing to the tube. Louis lets him go on for a bit even though he’s already planning to drive Harry. The sound of Harry’s voice is soothing and the chatter is helping to distract him. His brain is screaming at him to stop eating, it’s the loudest it’s been in a while and it’s exceedingly annoying.

‘I think I should just drive you to the appointment Harry, and just go park somewhere else while you’re there.’ He says eventually. ‘That all sounds too complicated.’

Harry looks up from his phone where he’s presumably been looking up the bus. ‘It’s actually not, I get public transport all the time Lou, it’s quicker than driving to work at certain times of the day. Trust me, I’ll be fine.’

‘I’m sure you would be fine Harry, but I’d still like to drive you, if that’s okay?’

Harry smiles and locks his phone, putting it down. ‘Okay. Thanks.’

He tries to clear away the dishes before Harry notices he hasn’t finished his food but he does not succeed. He has to reassure Harry what seems like about twenty times that it’s not because he didn’t like the food and his cooking is delicious. It is slightly annoying, but it’s also endearing that Harry cares so much that Louis liked what he made for him. It’s going to get stressful though if they have to go through this every time Louis is having a bad day.

‘Harry, everything you’ve made me has been delicious so far. But I’m probably not always going to finish everything you make for me, my appetite is weird and I’m not always up for a big meal.’ It’s not technically a lie. He really doesn’t want to start lying to Harry. He’s not opposed to telling him the truth actually, he just doesn’t want to get into it right this second.

‘Okay,’ Harry says, considering this. ‘But then, you have to be honest with me if you actually don’t like something, okay?’

‘Deal,’ Louis replies, stacking the last of the dishes in the drainer. ‘You know, I was very apprehensive about that salad you made me the other day. Definitely thought I wouldn’t like that. But is was fucking amazing. You’re definitely going to have to show me how you make that.’ He wipes his hands on a tea towel, and turns around to find Harry smiling.

‘I’m glad,’ he replies. ‘It seems silly, but sometimes it’s just good to know that something you did made someone happy, even if it’s just a small thing.’

Louis knows. Sometimes things like that are all that get him through the day. ‘I get it,’ he says kindly. ‘I really do.’

On the drive to the appointment, Harry seems nervous. He puts a Liam Payne album on just slightly too loud to allow for easy conversation, and closes his eyes. When Louis glances over every now and then, and sometimes he is mouthing the lyrics. Louis wonders if it is a comfort album for him.

‘I wrote that one,’ Harry announces suddenly in the brief silence between songs, and what? The song that had just played was actually one of Louis' favourites from the album, he’d listened to it a lot and it was a mainstay in his playlists.

‘You write for Liam Payne?’ He asks, surprised.

‘Yeah,’ Harry says, turning the music down slightly so they can talk. ‘He’s my friend. But yeah, I wrote on the two most recent albums.’

‘That - is insanely cool Harry. Also, first Nick Grimshaw, now Liam Payne? How many famous people are you friends with?’

Harry considers. ‘Cher Lloyd? Well, basically everyone from my x factor season, really.’

‘I never watched it, I was too fucking butthurt about not getting in,’ Louis admits.

‘Oh yeah you said. Shame. There were a lot of really talented people that year. I might have to make you watch it,’ Harry teases. They are getting into the city properly now, approaching their destination.

‘That song you just played, that you said you wrote, it’s one of my favourites.’

‘Really?’ Harry asks, sounding surprised. ‘So you’re a Liam fan then, even though you didn’t watch the show?’

‘Yeah. I discovered him later.’ He’s scanning the street ahead, seeing if he can stop anywhere to let Harry out. ‘It’s just up here, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah, it’s just at the end of the block.’

Louis spies what he thinks is a loading zone and pulls into it. ‘Text me when you’re done, okay?’

‘I will, thanks for the lift, Lou.’ Harry replies as he exits the car.

Louis drives out of the city a bit, meandering around the streets until he finds somewhere to park. He’s not sure quite where he is, exactly, when he does find a space, but it doesn’t matter. He’s just planning to go for a walk with Ariel to fill in the time, the location doesn’t make a difference. He gets her settled in the pram and wanders, the buildings on the streets bleeding from commercial to residential. It’s pleasant, but he doesn’t much like being alone with his thoughts, since they’re not good today. He pauses to fish out his phone from where he’d tossed it in the bottom of the pram, pleased to see he remembered his earphones as well. He plugs them in, thinking of putting on a podcast, maybe, but then he gets a better idea, and calls Zayn.

The call connects as Louis places his phone in his pocket to free his hands and begins walking again. ‘Hey Lou,’ Zayn answers. ‘What’s up?’

‘Just had some free time and thought I’d call for a bit of a chat, if you’re free.,’ Louis replies. ‘We haven’t in a while.’

‘Yeah that’s all good, I’m free. How have you been?’

‘Up and down. Not so good today, but getting through it. But, erm, I kind of decided something the other day I thought you might like to know.’

‘Yeah, what?’

‘I think it might be a good idea for me to find a new psychologist.’

There is silence for a second, and then - ‘Holy shit, that’s so good Lou. Oh my god.’

‘I thought you’d be happy. You’ve been kind of nagging me about it.’

‘I am happy, so happy. It’s a huge step and I’m so proud of you Louis. And I’m sorry about nagging you, but you’ve got to understand I’ve just been so worried about you, it’s a lot, you know?’

‘I know.’ Louis says quietly. ‘I’m really sorry Zayn.’

‘You don’t have to be sorry, you know I will always do my best to be there for you Louis. But I’m just one person, and having more people in your circle you can talk to about this, especially a professional, is just going to be so helpful for you.’

‘I hope so,’ Louis replies.

‘You said before you weren’t doing well today, do you wanna talk about it?’

‘Eh,’ Louis replies. ‘It’s just the same old, really. I felt like crap, didn't want to eat, made myself eat, and still feel like crap.’

Zayn makes a sympathetic sound. ‘That’s no good, I’m sorry.’

‘Thanks,’ Louis sighs. ‘The good thing is, I feel like it’s happening less often. Like, the last day it was this bad was over two weeks ago.’

‘Okay, yeah that’s something positive, I guess.’

‘Trust me, I’m taking whatever I can get at the moment,’ Louis laughs.

‘What are you doing now?’

‘Out for a walk with the baby I’m looking after.’

‘Oh, you’re doing private now?’

‘Yeah, I think I like it better. Did you hear about the daycare?’

‘Yep. Really fucking annoying too since I was this close to asking for my job back.’

‘Weren’t you studying? The art course?’ Louis asks.

‘Eh,’ Zayn replies. ‘Yes, technically. But it’s not as good as I thought it was going to be. I don’t know. Also I miss money.’

Louis laughs. ‘Fair.’

‘How’d you get the private gig?’

‘Picked up a babysitting job that turned into full time. It’s really good actually, I love it.’

‘That’s sweet, I’m happy for you Lou. Where are the jobs advertised anyway, I’ve never done private. Might look into it. And it might be easier to fit around the course if I decide to continue with it.’

Louis tells him the website he uses, and Zayn notes it down.

‘Thanks mate, I shall embark on my job hunt after this. Super keen to have money again. What are the families like? Is it all like rich and famous people? Also how’s the reaction been to hiring men?’

Louis thinks about the various casual jobs he’s picked up on weekends over the last few months. ‘I’ve had a few no’s that I suspect may have been due to my gender. But honestly most people seem happy just to find someone qualified and with good references. And no, most of the families are completely normal. But I am working for a celebrity at the moment.’

‘Cool. Are you allowed to tell people who they are, or is it all secret with NDA’s and shit?’

‘Nah. I can tell people. Like obviously I can’t give an exclusive interview to the Sun airing all his dirty laundry, but I can tell my friends. It’s Harry Styles.’

‘I have no idea who that is. Honestly, I’m so out of touch with pop culture that if a celebrity did hire me I probably wouldn’t even realise.’

Louis laughs. ‘They’d probably prefer that.’

‘Anyway, I’m going to send you through the details of my psychologist. I don’t think she’s taking on new patients at the moment because she’s got too many, but it might be worth looking into because her specialties are pretty much bang on with what you’ll be wanting, I think. Also she’s just awesome. And they might be able to refer you to someone with a similar skill set, if she can’t take you.’

‘Thank you so much Zayn, I really appreciate it.’

‘Happy to help. And I want you to know Louis, because it seems like you might need to hear this today - you are beautiful inside and out and you deserve the world, okay? I know you don’t feel that way right now, but just know that you are enough.’

Louis is so moved he feels like he might cry. ‘I - thanks Zayn. You have been absolutely amazing, helping me with all this.’

‘I think I was a bit of a dick to you a lot of the time, to be fair.’

Louis laughs. ‘That’s because you were worried. And Zayn, in case you need to hear it, the same goes for you too. You are literally the most attractive man I have seen in my entire life and you have a good heart too. You also deserve the world.’

‘Stop, Louis, I might start to actually feel emotions. But - thank you. Thanks for that.’

Louis smiles. He is so happy he called Zayn. ‘I think I’m gonna go, that's all I wanted to say really, unless you wanted to talk about anything else?’

‘Nah. I’m good, thanks though. I want to check out that website and apply for jobs. But thanks for the call, truly Louis. I’ve been worried about you and I’m so proud you’re making this step.’

‘Thanks.’ he says quietly. ‘Bye Zayn.’

‘Bye Lou. Take care’

Chapter Text

Harry is quiet on the ride home and so is Ariel - Louis finds her asleep when they arrive home. He puts her to bed and immediately goes to set his laptop up at the small table they’d eaten breakfast at. Harry is pottering around the kitchen, he’d said he wanted to cook and Louis had given him free reign.

After a bit of googling Louis is wishing Zayn had never passed on the details of his psychologist. Because she seems absolutely perfect but he can’t have her. As Zayn had thought, she isn’t taking new patients. If he’d never known this woman existed he could’ve just picked someone else from his shortlist and moved on with his life. But now he feels stuck.

It hasn’t escaped Louis' notice that Zayn’s psychologist specialises in eating disorders. Some of the things Zayn has said implied that he had previously been, or currently was, going through something similar to Louis. He’s never explicitly stated it though. Louis feels like Zayn sharing this information with him represents another level of trust entirely. It’s kind of huge, especially considering how strained their friendship has been recently.

It suddenly all seems a bit much, and he quickly ducks into the spare bedroom with his phone, because he’s pretty sure he’s about to cry, and he doesn’t want Harry to see. He sits on the bed Harry slept on last night as the tears start falling. He calls Zayn.

‘Hey Lou - Wait, Lou? What’s wrong? Are you crying?’

Louis can’t speak. It’s worse now he’s hearing Zayn’s voice, sounding so concerned.

‘Louis talk to me, what’s wrong babes? What do you need?’ Zayn’s voice is pleading now, still full of concern.

‘What - what you sent,’ he manages to choke out, between sobs.

There is a pause. ‘Louis,’ Zayn says carefully. ‘Come on now, Louis, you knew. You did.’

It’s true, and that makes it even worse. He had known, deep down, or at the very least, deeply suspected. He had known and he’d never even asked. He’d filed it under plausible deniability, and shoved it down with all the other things that hurt too much to think about.

‘I - I guess I just hoped I’d misinterpreted.’

Zayn sighs. ‘You didn’t Lou. Come on now, it’s okay,’ he says, in response to Louis’ crying.’

‘It’s not!’ He bursts out. ‘It’s not okay Zayn! I wouldn’t wish this upon anyone!’

‘I’m okay now, if that helps. I have been for a while.’

Louis forces himself to stop crying, forces himself to think about what he wants to say. ‘That - that’s good. That’s really good, I’m so glad to hear that. But - you still went through it, and that kills me to think about.’

‘I’m sorry Louis. I didn’t mean to make you upset.’

‘Don’t be sorry,’ Louis says. He’s not sure what else to say. ‘I - I think I’m gonna go.’

‘Okay,’ Zayn says quietly. ‘I’m here if you need anything Louis.’

‘Okay,’ Louis replies, and hangs up. He stares at his phone for a bit, at the blank screen, just trying to make sense of what he’s feeling. He lays down on Harry’s bed and closes his eyes. Today has not been a good day and he doesn’t think it’s going to get any better. Negative thoughts wash over him like acid rain, hurting again and again. He thinks of Zayn feeling the same way, and it’s just awful. He can feel himself falling into a place he’s not sure he’ll be able to get out of and he tries to focus, because it hurts too much and he’s not sure he can stand it. He pinches his wrist, focuses on the smell of Harry’s shampoo on the pillow, and forces himself to open his eyes.

He wants a fucking drink but it’s not even 2pm and he’s working. His anxiety is spiking, not just thrumming in the background like it normally does. He needs to do something. The fear that he’ll feel like this for the rest of his life is very real right now, and it’s fueling his anxiety.

He decides to write an email to Zayn’s psychologist. He knows that very likely nothing will come of it, but maybe it will help his anxiety run its course. Then, once he’s done, maybe he’ll be able to focus on choosing someone who’s actually taking patients. He cleans his face as best he can, hoping it doesn’t look too obvious he’s been crying.

‘Oh, that’s where you went!’ Harry says, as he emerges from the room. He’s still in the kitchen, various ingredients and utensils spread out on the counter before him, a pot on the hob.

‘Just needed to make a phone call,’ Louis says, as he turns away from Harry to walk back to the little table where his laptop sits.

‘Oh sorry, was the music too loud?’ Harry asks.

Louis hadn’t even noticed. Harry was playing something extremely upbeat and poppy from his phone, he didn’t recognise the song. ‘No,’ he replies as he sits down. ‘Just wanted some privacy.’

‘Oh okay, no worries.’

The conversation drops off there as Harry goes back to his cooking and Louis unlocks his computer. Writing the email feels like his soul is being squeezed out through his fingertips on the keyboard. It’s kind of awful, to see all his problems and failures typed out like that, in sharp black letters against the bright white screen. Once he’s done, he goes back to check one section, reading over it to ensure it makes sense.

Harry’s voice interrupts his thoughts. ‘Louis, I made some soup, if you want some?’

Louis had forgotten Harry was even in his flat, let alone making food. He’d been completely absorbed in writing the email. He responds reflexively without properly considering his words, his mind a fragile, toxic place after writing out every hellish thing about his recent life. ‘God no, I can’t eat right now.’ He snaps, then closes his eyes when he realises how harsh that sounded. He opens them to find an expression of hurt mixed with concern on Harry’s face. ‘Sorry Harry. I’m really sorry. I’m gonna eat lunch later, okay?’

Harry nods, still looking a little hurt. ‘Well, I made a lot, so there’s plenty for when you want it.’

Louis thanks him, and Harry comes to sit on the couch near Louis with his food. ‘What are you working on?’ He asks curiously as he sits down. ‘You look stressed.’

‘The psychologist I want isn’t taking new patients, so I’m emailing her to like, plead my case, if you will.’

‘I didn’t know that was a thing people did,’ Harry responds, dipping a piece of toast into his soup.

‘I have no idea if it’s a thing people do, but I decided to do it anyway.’

‘Huh,’ Harry responds, and they fall into silence as Harry eats his meal and Louis reads over his email. Once he’s happy with it, he sends it out into the abyss and closes his laptop, relieved it’s done. He gets up and climbs onto the couch beside Harry, tucking his feet up under him. He rests his forehead against Harry’s upper arm, the skin bare as his t-shirt sleeves are rolled up.

‘This okay?’ He asks, focusing on his breathing and the warmth of Harry’s skin to try to calm himself.

‘Yeah,’ Harry replies. ‘You okay?’

‘No.’ Louis admits. ‘I was already feeling awful and then I had the brilliant idea to write that stupid email, it just made me feel worse, I think.’

‘You weren’t feeling good? Like, this morning? You didn’t say.’

‘I didn’t want to bother you. You’re going through a lot at the moment.’

‘You can still talk to me. Tell me if you’re feeling bad, or if there’s something on your mind. We can help each other.’

Louis sighs. ‘I’d like that. Okay.’ He lifts his forehead from Harry’s arm, looking up at him. ‘Promise you’ll tell me if it gets too much though? Like, if me talking about my problems is upsetting you too much, or triggering you. It’s okay to be a little selfish about our own mental health.’

Harry nods in agreement. ‘Absolutely, I will, as long as you can do the same for me. I know I can be a lot, sometimes.’

‘It’s a deal,’ Louis says, and they smile at each other. Louis pauses for a second, gathering his thoughts before he speaks again. ‘I think - I think it was just, that email was like my soul splattered onto the page. All the ugly parts spelled out and bare for anyone to see.’

‘Yikes,’ Harry replies. ‘That sounds super fun, Louis, tell me again why you put yourself through that experience?’

‘To beg some poor woman who isn’t even taking new patients to take me. Fuck my life.’

‘Well, at least it’s done now. Hey, you want me to heat you up some soup now you’re done with it? You didn’t eat much this morning, you must be hungry.’

Louis definitely feels something in his gut, but he’s not sure if it’s hunger, nausea, or a mix of the two. ‘Maybe,’ he muses, considering. ‘What kind of soup is it?’

‘Pumpkin. I wanted to use up the rest of the pumpkin I didn’t use for the pizza.’

Louis thinks maybe pumpkin soup could be doable, but he’s not sure if he wants to put himself through the trauma of eating right this second. He’s saved from answering though, when Ariel’s cries sound through the baby monitor ‘I’ll get her,’ he says.

As he stands up, he feels a slight wave of lightheadedness hit him. He pauses for a second, making sure he’s good before heading to his room. Fuck. He’d been hoping the egg and toast he’d had this morning would tide him over longer than this, but apparently not. He’d exercised, maybe that was it. Or maybe it was because he’d been eating fairly okay for the last few days, and his body wasn’t coping with the sudden deprivation. Whatever the reason, he was going to have to eat now whether he wanted to or not. He was doubtful he would actually faint if he didn’t eat, but the lightheadedness could also make him lose his balance. The risk that he could fall just wasn’t a risk he was willing to take while he was looking after Ariel, not when the problem could be easily fixed by eating something.

He lifts Ariel out of the cot tenderly and cuddles her briefly before putting the change mat on his bed and laying her down on it. She looks up at him with her big green eyes, content after her nap, and Louis’ mouth twitches into a small smile. He changes her nappy, then sits down on the edge of the bed and gives her a proper cuddle. A rush of much needed oxytocin floods his brain at the contact, pooling around the jagged emotions residing there, soothing some of the painful ones.

He leaves his room with Ariel still cradled to his chest, detouring to put the dirty nappy in the bin by the front door before heading back to the couch in the living room.

‘I think I’d like some of the soup, yeah.’ He confirms to Harry, as he hands Ariel to him. ‘Just gonna wash my hands.’

Harry beams at him as he takes Ariel. ‘Great!’

Louis walks to the kitchen to wash his hands. Harry follows him, and hands Ariel back to him when he’s done.

‘I’ll get your soup now,’ he says, taking care to make sure the baby is settled on Louis’ shoulder.

‘Thanks,’ Louis replies, adjusting Ariel before he heads back to sit on the couch. He hears the fridge and microwave door opening and closing.

‘I had toast with mine, do you want some too?’ Harry calls.

‘Nah,’ says Louis. He settles on the couch, turning Ariel to face him so he can make faces at her. ‘Just the soup is fine.’

‘Gotcha,’ Harry replies. The microwave beeps and then Harry returns with a steaming bowl of soup. He places it on the coffee table, then takes Ariel from Louis so he can eat. Louis picks up the bowl. He feels sick.

‘Tell me a story,’ he says, turning to look at Harry.

Harry looks amused. ‘Is my sole purpose in life to provide you with food and entertainment now?’

‘Yes,’ Louis confirms. He sips some soup from the spoon, and it’s the oddest sensation. He can taste the delicious flavours, the rich curry balanced out by the sweetness of the pumpkin, the perfect amount of salt. But it’s hard to swallow, because he doesn’t want it. The screaming in his brain is making him hyper aware of all his flaws, and it’s almost unbearable.

‘About what?’ Harry asks.

‘Like, anything. Something funny or embarrassing that’s happened to you.’ His voice is a fraction too high and a tad too fast, because he’s starting to feel panicky now too. God he really is a fucking mess. He takes another sip, focusing on what Zayn had said on the phone earlier - you are beautiful inside and out.

‘Hmm,’ Harry muses. ‘Ooh, I think this is kind of funny. It’s definitely embarrassing. Okay, so I was fifteen, and my boyfriend at the time invited me over for a romantic weekend. He was looking after his cousin’s cat while she was away, and she had a pretty flash place. Anyway, the plan was to take advantage of the privacy and finally do a bit more than a rushed hand job. He cooked a fancy dinner and served it with an expensive red wine. I’m not sure quite what happened - I remember I was nervous about having sex, and kept drinking more to try and quell the nerves. Keep in mind, I was fifteen and not used to drinking at all.’

Louis laughs. ‘Harry, I can’t see how this story is going to end well.’ The soup is going down a little easier now, Harry’s words are providing a welcome distraction. His body has started to realise that underneath the nausea, he’s actually hungry. Well of course he is. He’s only had half a piece of egg on toast all day, he’s fucking starving.

‘It doesn’t end well,’ Harry confirms, smiling. ‘I think it was a combination of the alcohol and nerves, but I ended up having to run to the bathroom to spew in the middle of foreplay.’

Louis laughs. ‘Oh god no Harry! You poor thing.’

‘Not the sexiest thing I’ve ever done, but he still wanted me so that’s something. Too bad the sex was awful.’

‘How bad?’ He sips some more soup. Be kind to yourself, he tells himself. You’re allowed to nourish your body.

‘Bad. He was inexperienced and didn’t open me up properly. Didn’t help that I was still so nervous as well. Fucking hurt like a bitch. It was my first time too.’

‘Your first time? Shit, that’s rough.’

‘Yup. Put me off sex for a good while actually. Thinking back, honestly we probably shouldn’t have even gone through with it when I was that tipsy and nervous.’

Louis thinks on this. He knows that if he thought his partner was too inebriated, or visibly quite nervous or anxious, he wouldn’t want to have sex with them. He’d want to focus more on calming them down, cuddling, whatever they needed - because that would feel more appropriate to him. He knows, unfortunately from experience, that not everyone shares his viewpoint. A hazy memory of Kale pounding into him while Louis was extremely drunk flits across his brain. Hastily, he pushes the memory back down deep where it belongs.

‘I wouldn’t,’ he says, putting the nearly finished bowl of soup down on the coffee table, trying to think about anything else. How fucking proud of himself he is for eating the soup. How vulnerable Harry’s eyes look right now. Anything. ‘I wouldn’t fuck you if you were like that.’

Harry smiles weakly. ‘I think I accidentally told a sad story. Sorry.’

‘You should be. I requested something funny. Now I want to cry my eyes out because you weren’t treated like a princess for your first time.’

‘If it helps I’ve been treated like a princess many times since.’

‘Good. As you deserve.’

Harry smiles shyly and gestures to Louis’ bowl. ‘Thank you. You done?’

Louis nods. ‘Yeah. How are you so good at cooking? That was like, a work of art in a bowl.’

Harry looks shy as he passes Ariel to Louis so he can do the dishes. ‘I don’t know,’ he says as he picks up Louis’ bowl and walks to the kitchen. ‘I just really enjoy it, so I cook a lot. I like tweaking recipes and making them over again to find the best flavour combinations. I was actually considering culinary school before the music thing finally took off.’

‘Really? That’s pretty cool.’

‘Yeah,’ Harry replies, raising his voice a little to be heard over the running water as he washes Louis’ bowl. ‘Still might do it someday. Don’t know really how long the music thing will last, or how long I’ll want to do it, you know?’

‘Yeah, that’s fair,’ Louis hears the kettle boiling and the fridge door opening in the kitchen. ‘Ooh, are you making tea?’ He asks.

‘No, I’m warming a bottle, but I can make you tea if you like.’

Louis frowns. He’d just been thinking Ariel would be wanting a bottle soon, and had been planning to get up and make one, maybe make a few all at the same time like they often did, to get her through her supper and night feeds. ‘If there was a bottle in the fridge, chuck it out Harry, it’ll be old. I haven’t made any up today.’

‘It’s not old,’ Harry replies. ‘I made up a few bottles earlier.’

‘You did?’ Louis is surprised. ‘Harry, you don’t have to do that, that’s my job.’

‘It’s all good. I wanted to. How do you want your tea?’

‘Erm, Yorkshire with milk please. No sugar,’ Louis replies. It was strange, it felt like the dynamic had shifted since yesterday, slowly shifting from Louis looking after Harry to Harry looking after Louis. He wasn’t quite sure how he felt about that.

He adjusts how he’s sitting, putting his thighs together and lying Ariel down on his lap lengthwise, so her feet are tickling his belly. He marvels at how she’s small enough to fit on his lap comfortably like this, and slowly combs a bit of her dark hair with his fingers as she gazes up at him, content wonder in her eyes.

‘Dad’s getting you a bottle,’ he says quietly to her, as he strokes her head. ‘Actually, he’s getting me a drink too. Aren’t we lucky? He’s good to us, isn’t he? Are you hungry?’

‘What are you two talking about?’ Harry asks, grinning amusedly as he walks over to the couch with a bottle in one hand and a mug in the other. He places them on the coffee table.

‘Ariel says she’s happy to hear you are bringing her a nice warm bottle, instead of a yucky cold one like I tried to give her last night.’

‘Did Louis give you a cold bottle?’ Harry asks Ariel as he carefully takes her from Louis’ lap. ‘How awful.’

‘Louis was tired,’ he says, in his own defence. ‘It was worth a shot.’

Harry grins at him as he takes the bottle and starts to feed Ariel. ‘I was only joking Lou.’

‘I know, Harry.’ He remembers his tea, and leans forward to pluck the mug from the coffee table, cupping his hands around it to enjoy the warmth. ‘Thank you for the tea.’

‘It was no problem,’ Harry replies.

‘Sorry if I’ve been a bit much today. I know you said in the car you didn’t want to talk about it, but if you do need to talk, or vent about your appointment, or anything else really, you can.’

‘You haven’t been too much Lou. I like that we’re communicating better. And yes, I do want to talk about today with you, but maybe later. It was kind of a lot, and I’m still processing everything.’

‘That’s okay. Whenever you do want to talk about it, you can.’

‘Thank you,’ Harry says softly as he looks down at Ariel. His long hair is tucked behind his ear, little wispy curls escaping.

Louis kind of wants to put something on for them to watch, like stand up comedy, or a movie. But he’d read an article the other day that said that even having the TV on in the background was bad for babies, which fucking sucked balls. He’s definitely going to have to do some more research on that, to see how accurate it is. For now though, he decides to look up jokes on his phone and tell them to Harry to entertain them both. It’s good to see Harry laugh, to see his eyes light up and briefly not look so sad. Louis takes full advantage of having Ariel awake as well, giving her lots of cuddles and making eye contact and talking to her, in between telling jokes to Harry.

‘You seem to like, actually really enjoy interacting with her,’ Harry observes at one point.

Louis nods. ‘I do. She makes me feel better.’

‘How so?’

Louis starts babbling on without really thinking about what he's saying, excited as always to share his knowledge about childcare. ‘Obviously I have to get to know the child a little first, but interacting with babies makes me happy. It’s actually a chemical reaction a lot of people get when looking after children, you know, to help with bonding. It gives you that warm fuzzy feeling.’ He’s about to go on, but stops abruptly, realising he has very likely just fucked up. Shit. His suspicions are confirmed when he looks up to find Harry staring at him blankly. Fuck, fuck, fuck. ‘It doesn’t happen to everyone,’ he adds, in a vain effort to salvage the derailing conversation.

Harry is quiet, before he speaks. ‘I think I’m going to go lie down for a bit,’ he says, looking down at his hands where he’s twisting them together. He gets up abruptly and walks to the spare room, taking his phone with him and closing the door behind him.