God, fuck irony, Harry swore, silent but no less venomous, his balls about as blue as the ocean water Louis was standing in, Fuck irony up the arse sideways.
As a fully grown adult human, he had known, was the thing – known that life was unfair, that the universe didn’t play by the rules, that, in the immortal words of The Rolling Stones, ‘you can’t always get what you want’.
Well, ‘known’. Like, theoretically.
But, Harry also liked to live life with a certain amount of optimism and an… appropriate level of functional delusion, and as such, had convinced himself that those lyrics didn’t necessarily apply to him, specifically. They were more something pithy one recited when their three year-old twins were screaming for popsicles at four in the morning.
And sure, there were things in Harry’s life that hadn’t worked out and moments that had truly broken his heart (he was, after all, a divorcee), but he had always contented himself with the notion that, should he ever want something badly enough, the universe would never be cruel enough to flat out deny him of it.
Turns out, it would.
In fact, it would go several steps further and dangle Harry’s dreams right in front of his face in the form of six unrelenting days of seeing Louis Tomlinson in various states of dampness – from shower, to sea, to sweat, over, and over, and over like some kind of perpetually sexually charged Sisyphean nightmare – only to have him plan to leave in T-minus twenty-four hours without hope of so much as one bonus night of recklessly nostalgic passion for poor, lonely, super horny Harry.
Harry ignored him, his laughter petering out naturally as Louis waited for the line to click. In the distance, the sight of the volleyball team running back and forth across the sand caught their attention again.
“Totally could have beaten them,” Harry scoffed bitterly, mostly to himself. “I held up so well, and my technique was flawless.”
“Mm-hmm,” Louis hummed doubtfully, turning his skeptical gaze back to Harry again. “Maybe if tush wiggling was an official Olympic sport,” he teased.
And, whatever Louis had been expecting in response, it was not Harry beaming, bright and too-pleased for his own good, a delicate pinkness to his cheeks that Louis wisely chose to attribute to the summer sun.
“You noticed,” Harry said, lilt soft, devilish in an entirely different way. He relaxed and leaned his shoulders back against the beach lounger in a move that could only be described as… triumphant, his voice just on the right side of cocky as he added, “Good.”
Louis scoffed, good natured and light. “Please. Those poor boys behind you couldn’t keep their eyes on a neon pink ball.”
To that, Harry chuckled, slowly tipping his sunglasses down, a lazy smirk curling at the corner of his lips. “Don’t really care where their eyes are, Lou,” he said. He paused, and though it was seemingly just to playfully rake his gaze down Louis’ body, Louis couldn’t help but remember how that trademark sentence used to end; the way it was whispered, hot and demanding, against the shell of his ear, always sandwiched between a delicious moan or two as their spice cabinet rattled wildly behind them.
‘…Care where yours are…’
Louis felt himself short circuit, just a very little, because…
‘…it was very, very possible that Harry’s sudden bout of jealousy was unconscious… just misplaced nostalgia and misguided muscle memory… Maybe…’
Okay, so, maybe not.
His earlier words swirled around in his mind throughout the rest of the afternoon, each repetition accompanied by an echo of the past.
In honour of H looking like a babe, a little sneak peek in any of your wips? Please
Anything, in honor of H looking like the beautiful Barbie babe on glitter toast he was last night. 🥰
Also, I’m so sorry if I’ve posted this already, I truly can’t remember (and apparently tumblr will only show half of my tags!) (I have to work on a proper masterpost!)
***
🐘 Snippet
“A bald-faced lie straight to my face,” Harry said, shaking his head and clicking his tongue in faux disappointment. His voice was scandalized as he playfully accused, “And on our thirtieth anniversary? How dare you?”
Louis gave him a cheeky shrug, his forkful of eggs poised in front of that unfailingly sexy smirk, “I was testing you.”
“Well,” Harry said, too smug, “I have the memory of an elephant, so…”
Louis narrowed his eyes at Harry, his next hum doubtful and teasing. “Oh yeah, Dumbo?” he challenged, “You remember proposing to me on our third date?”
Harry didn’t even bother to put his fork down, leveling him with an unimpressed look. “Nice try, liar. You don’t think I remember our third date was when I drank my weight in grocery wine?”
Louis snorted at the memory. “I had to carry you home to my flat.”
“Okay, I was nervous, wanker. We both knew we were going to have sex that night.”
“And yet.” Louis quipped around the lip of his coffee cup, though not quite quietly enough. “Also,” he said, brow furrowing in confusion, “we’d already had sex—”
“Yeah, but not on purpose.” Harry’s very clear explanation was followed by Louis’ completely befuddled silence, and he sighed, exasperatedly elaborating, “This was on-purpose Third Date Sex™ with possibly-my-future-husband.”
“Mm-hmm.” Louis nodded slowly – shrewdly. “As opposed to our original, ‘accidental’—” He smirked as he did the air quotes. “—our-friends-locked-us-in-a-flat-to-bang-out-our-sexual-tension hate sex.” His sound of agreement was muffled by his half-chewed fruit. “Right, got it.”
With a blink, his voice deadly serious, Harry said, “Exactly.” Ignoring Louis’ low chuckle, he continued, “Anyway, that night was, ironically, painfully memorable and I definitely, definitely did not propose.”
“Except when you did.”
Harry’s scoff was loud and sure, fully expecting to look across the table and catch Louis in his second shameless lie of the morning. Instead, he was met with the kind of confident smirk that… actually gave him pause.
“I was rubbing your back—well, trying to,” Louis corrected, “because you kept literally, physically, pushing me away. You started to cry when I wouldn’t leave you in the bathroom.”
And that… did, actually, sound like him, he admitted inwardly. But why would he—
“You kept insisting I couldn’t see you like this because,” Louis continued, his voice already twinkling with very poorly concealed mirth, “as you explained, if I did, I’d never marry you like I was supposed to.”
Harry’s eyes widened, realizing just then that he was vehemently shaking his head. “No,” he said desperately horrified. “Uh-uh. No.”
“But, apparently,” Louis said, thoroughly enjoying this, “if I promised I’d still marry you,” he grinned wide, too, too amused, “then I was allowed to stay and keep you from choking on your own vomit.”
“No.” Harry refused. “No. No, because,” he argued, holding up a finger, “I asked you, the next morning, if I’d done anything – anything – stupid. And you—” He pointed aggressively at Louis, who was pressing his lips together, trying (and failing) to hide his smile, “—Promised me, Louis, that I didn’t.”
“I had to,” he argued, as Harry’s jaw dropped.
“Louis!” He screeched in disbelief. “You lied?!”
“H, love,” he tried to coax gently. (Or, as gentle as one could be while trying – so hard – to stifle a laugh.) And, if Harry wasn’t already sitting there, stewing in over three decades of delayed embarrassment, he’d be a bit concerned about the way his heart still flipped a little at that endearment. “You should’ve seen yourself, all hungover, and delicate, and vulnerable that morning.” His eyes were soft – annoyingly so – even twinkling with mirth, and so, all Harry could do was roll his eyes and click his tongue in some semblance of disapproval as Louis defended himself. “I mean, you genuinely looked like you would’ve run from the room if I’d told you.”
“I would’ve,” Harry assured him point blank and without missing a beat. “I’d have completely cut you off,” he said, dead serious. “Moved continents. Flung myself off the edge of the earth.”
“Well then,” Louis said pointedly, a laugh bleeding into his voice, “now you know why I didn’t.” He shrugged, seemingly retrospective. “Also, it was nice to know you were a sure thing,” he added, his irritatingly charming wink earning him a rather aggressive (and much deserved) bread roll to the shoulder. Harry may or may not have stuck his tongue out in victory the moment it hit him with a satisfying smack! ‘Ow,’ Louis mouthed with a silent laugh, eyes sparkling as he continued to tease, “and it just seemed like a needless complication, doing anything that would encourage you to become a flight risk, when, you know,” he sighed, pretending to be put upon. His gaze on Harry turned hot, and he smiled at him in a way that seemed entirely dedicated to making his heart flutter. “I did fully intend to marry you by then anyway, all drunken threats to your personal safety notwithstanding.”
Where did you come up with the idea for your story?
Where/when does your story take place?
How many chapters will it be?
What chapter are you on?
Who is your favourite major character in your story? Why?
Who is your favourite minor character in your story? Why?
What is the first line of the story?
What is the last line of the story?
What is your favourite line so far in the story? Why?
Will we laugh, cry or say "oh my"?
What is one thing you want to tell us most about your story?
Feel free to answer as many or as few questions as you wish.
Take care. 💕
Ooh!! Some really good questions here, but I’m most touched about the first one.
✨ Where did you come up with the idea for your story?
My godfather and his wife divorced about seven years ago. They have four (crazy!) grown children, and had been each other’s legit best friends up until my godfather passed suddenly this February. I always thought they were meant to be together, but just got a little lost along the way.
This story is a little bit how I wished theirs would have turned out. ❤️
✨ What’s the first line of the story? (This is the first line of the first chapter, but there’s a prologue.)
In hindsight, there were so many, many, many, many clues, and Harry had no idea how he had managed to miss them all.
✨ What’s your favorite line in the story so far?
Like they were on (somewhat) similar wavelengths, Louis’ eyes found Harry’s, and he pressed, sweet and earnest, “Is it your back?” His thumb began to draw light, soothing swipes at his waist and Harry was truly going to lose it, nearly going cross-eyed between Louis’ barely-there touch and his suddenly incredibly detailed memories. “Can I do anything for it?”
Break it, Harry’s whore of a mind supplied, the words ready to careen straight off his tongue. Just fucking crack me like a glow stick on the overwater balcony already!
“Permission to continue, Captain?” Louis asked, sarcastically, to which Harry stuck out his tongue. Good enough, he thought. “All I’m saying is, I really don’t think we need to sell it. I mean, for all anyone here knows, we’ve been together thirty years and are in a sexless marriage on the brink of divorce.”
Harry’s scoff was loud and deeply offended. “Okay, first of all,” he argued, gesturing between them, “look at us. We’d never be in a sexless anything—”
And, okay, Louis thought, tipping his head back and forth, fair enough.
“—and second,” Harry continued without missing a beat, “this is serious, Lou. Mrs. Riaz went all out. I mean, the villa alone is five thousand—”
“What, like, per week?”
Harry looked at him like he couldn’t possibly be serious. “Per night.”
Louis felt like he’d been punched in the stomach, the air flying straight out of his lungs as his eyes bulged out of his head. “Five thousand pounds?” he choked out, feeling his vertigo kicking in.
“No. Butterflies,” Harry deadpanned, completely unhelpful. He threw up a hand, exasperated. “Yes, pounds.”
“Jesus Christ, Harry,” Louis hissed, panicked and barely above a whisper now, “what the hell did you and Noah do for this place? Build it from the ground?!”
“No, but,” Harry started to explain quickly, “the Kardashians stayed at their competitors’ property last summer, so their sales dipped massively. They didn’t think hiring celebutantes was on brand, so I pitched a twelve-photo spread and negotiated the earliest spot possible in Condé Nast. Then, I just squeezed them into my schedule at the last minute, and it worked.”
He waved off the story like it wasn’t massively impressive, but Louis would beg to disagree. Despite his mini heart attack, he could feel the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as he remembered all the odd (and frankly, back breaking) photography gigs Harry had taken with gusto in the early years, to help them make ends meet – everything from children’s parties, to school photos, to low-budget proms; weekends spent setting up lights, and carrying equipment back and forth as a runner for barely-middle-tier photographers who wouldn’t even let him touch a camera.
And now… now, Harry had flown the world thrice-over, his name printed in the byline of every travel and lifestyle magazine worth reading, had enough pull to his name that he could drop a last-minute photo spread on the lap of Condé Nast and they’d be willing to ‘negotiate’, was apparently gifted £100,000 luxury hotel holidays and yet, when pressed, still thought the very best part of his entire career was that their son actually wanted to do it with him.
Discreetly, Louis pressed his lips together, fighting the full force of his grin and pushing back the flicker of pride that had begun to heat the bottom of his belly, in favor of tuning back into what Harry was saying.
“…and Noah even managed to get the proofs to layout in less than thirty-six hours. Plus,” Harry excused, his tone filled with genuine humility, “Mrs. Riaz is an heiress, so her concept of outrageously expensive is…” he gestured vaguely in the air, “a little different.”
Louis snorted. “Understatement, much?”
Harry ignored him. “Anyway, the point is,” he said, even quieter now, his gaze serious and unwavering as they walked into the shade of the main lobby, “unless you left the UK wondering how you were gonna blow a spare fifty grand, we actually do, absolutely, have to sell this.”
Clutching a hand to his heart, Louis’ jaw dropped theatrically in faux-offense. “Harry Styles,” he chastised in a scandalized whisper, “are you actually making me go halfsies on our thirtieth anniversary? Psh.” His head recoiled on his neck. “Kind of a dick move, dude,” he joked.
“I mean,” Harry chuckled, shrugging sheepishly as he shook his head. He pulled the door to the bar open and motioned for Louis to go ahead. But just as Louis stepped in front of him, fully intending to make a quip about how gallantly opening a door for him wasn’t going to make up for Harry being a cheap date, Harry smirked and leaned in close. His breath was warm, just skating the shell of Louis’ ear as he whispered, “Not if you were planning to put out.”
😏 More from the GAPT AU
For this anon. Sorry it took so long! I hope you see it!
A little 80s reminiscing for @sarafinaslarryinlove (not sure why my tags aren’t working!)
—
“This is an irresponsible decision, Louis,” he admitted aloud, believing for just a moment that saying it would knock some sense into him. A pause. Nothing. “Like, by far the most idiotic one you’ve made in the last decade,” he tried again, just to twist the knife. Another, longer pause. Still nothing.
Bollocks.
He was certain that would work. Clearly, fight or flight was a load of shit.
Usually, staring his own inane foolishness in the face was not something that Louis just… accepted, seeing as he wasn’t exactly the kind of man who made bad decisions a habit. Anymore.
There was once a time he was the king of them; made them daily – hourly, even – without rhyme or reason, as easy as breathing.
Going on a twelve-hour-long pub crawl the night before his final exams, just because Harry, Niall’s little know-it-all second year friend, had declared it ‘the dumbest idea he’d ever had’? Standard Monday.
Sneaking all the boys into a random gig after that very same Harry had the audacity to doubt Louis could, and then going home with the lead singer of whatever C-list new wave band had been playing that night because Harry had actually scoffed out loud when the guy had hit on Louis? Tuesday. (…That rolled over into Wednesday, and then Thursday.)
Fucking up his entire third year course schedule on a whim, so he could enroll in an Intermedia Arts class he had absolutely no business taking, just so he could spend it irritatiting the fuck out of Harry, who was, as far as Louis was concerned, just a prissy, pompous, pretentious, curly-haired photography student who still refused to hand over, what Louis maintains to this day, was rightfully his David Bowie cassette? The better part of 1983.
He’d had a penguin permanently tattooed on his arse, for Christ’s sake! All because he and Harry had been having some petty argument he couldn’t even remember (strangely enough, somehow related to that three-night stand with not-quite-Duran-Duran), and Louis had felt so terrible about making him cry that he’d panicked – decided then and there that he would do (and, clearly did) absolutely anything to make Harry honk out that annoying (read: kind of adorable) donkey bray again.
And, maybe it said something that every single one of those examples had somehow involved winning Harry’s attention, however unfavorable (and, how Louis had managed to convince himself that was a completely normal reaction to a platonic frenemy, he’d never know), but Louis wasn’t one to dwell. At least, not when he was trapped in a bathroom with his ex on the other side of the door waiting for him.
So, it was settled: Louis was officially sticking by what was clearly the absolute dumbest decision he’d likely ever make in this half of his lifetime.
And while Louis’ last darling quip allowed for Harry’s annoyance to wage a fair enough war against his guilt for a little while longer, Harry’s urge to apologize only persisted, rather aggressively, the closer they got to the restaurant. Yet, he still found himself uncharacteristically tongue-tied by the time they were discussing the proper strategy by which to conquer the breakfast buffet.
“I saw an omelette stand set up at the end,” Louis said, leaning in close with his voice low and serious, like he was sharing a state secret.
“Mmm,” Harry hummed, nodding as he completed Louis’ thought in the same, businesslike tone, “those always have the longest waiting time, so one of us should go and order there, while the other does a first lap.”
“Exactly,” Louis confirmed, craning his neck as he spoke, as though to check that the omelette stand hadn’t just up and walked away. “I think I should go,” he said decisively. At Harry’s disagreeable pout, Louis leveled him with a flat stare, and added, “Harry, you know you get all soft around seniors and newlyweds. You let every grandad in Edinburgh cut the line at that bed and breakfast we stayed at, that one anniversary.”
Harry’s jaw dropped. “I was being polite,” he defended. Feeling his heart melt just thinking about it, he turned to Louis with wide, beseeching eyes. “Plus, they move so slowly…”
Louis’ expression remained impassive as he reminded him, “And we had breakfast at noon.”
Fair enough.
“Fine,” Harry acquiesced, mostly to Louis’ back, seeing as he was already striding towards the table. Belatedly, Harry called out, “Spinach—”
“Mushroom, artichoke, feta,” Louis answered easily, twisting his body around to face Harry as he walked backward. “I know, H. And you’re route has to be cereals, sweets—”
“Savories, juices, and breads, in that order,” Harry recited, his lip twitching upwards in begrudging amusement, “so the toast and eggs’ll both be hot when we sit down.” Aware that the tension had settled between them, at least for now, Harry boldly added a playful eye roll. “This isn’t my first rodeo, Tomlinson.”
“Prove it,” Louis quipped back without missing a beat, and weren’t those rough, gravely words of challenge, coupled with that smirk just a tad suggestive for such talk of early morning sustenance?
Harry only had enough time to staunchly ignore the rhetorical question before Louis was looking down at his watch.
“Meet back here in fifteen minutes,” he instructed. “Any later and I’ll assume the grandads finally got you.” The dad joke was accompanied by a shot with a cheesy finger gun and, in Harry’s opinion, a needlessly attractive wink.
Cute—I mean, rude, he corrected inwardly, struggling against a small, charmed smile. It broke free anyway, the second Louis’ back was fully turned. Determinedly, he shook it off, frowning and furrowing his brow as he staunchly reminded himself, You’re still fighting. You’re still fighting, you’re still fighting, you’re still fighting.
The repetitive mantra allowed Harry to hold onto a respectable modicum of indignance over their argument all throughout cereals and most of sweets, his resolve only really beginning to falter somewhere around the third waffle. It gave way entirely at the sight of an overflowing stack of freshly grilled, perfectly crisp bacon, a bit of the oil still shining under the light of the heating lamp.
Bacon. Otherwise known as Harry’s preferred vehicle of apology to Louis for most of the late nineties to the early aughts. (Young and armed with a standing subscription to, quite literally, every health magazine in the UK, Harry had resolutely declared a ban on any bacon not of the turkey variety, in their home. He broke this rule for only two occasions: birthdays… and attempts to get out of the dog house.)
Can you give us another GAPT AU snippet please? I miss them! I miss these two.
And your “Oh’s”! In italics. No one does it like you.
Oh.
Oh.
Ohh.
Ohhh. Oh!
Each has a different feel, tone, mood. I love it so much. But the snippet doesn’t necessarily have to contain any of them. I just want to see how they are? I’m kinda in love with them. 🥺
Yeah. I know.
Oh.
Hello my love, my darling! 💕
First of all, this was the cutest way to ask for a snippet ever, and I am so flattered. Thank you! Second, I’m sorry I couldn’t answer this right away. It’s been so hard to get myself to write recently, and I found myself missing these two, too.
BUT! (Not quite an ‘oh’, but a very big ‘but’!) Today, I did! So, thank you, thank you, thank you for the encouragement! ✨
🌩 Divorcés in (not-so) Paradise Snippet
He hadn’t even finished his sentence when he saw Louis shaking his head with his hands on his hips, his tongue pressed flat against his front teeth. It was a stance Harry had seen on him countless times before: Louis was… over it; over the argument, over expending any more energy, over being here with Harry…
Just… over it.
Expression blank and eyes tired, he sighed. “You still always have to win, huh?”
Harry’s indignation at the familiar accusation was immediate, like muscle memory, his frown etched deep in his forehead because, Okay, that was beyond unfair, and wasn’t at all his intention. It wasn’t his fault Louis’ plan had more holes in it than a slice of cheese. Better Harry notice than anyone else.
He was just about to repeat this very logical thought aloud, lips already parted and haughty words at the ready, when he found Louis had already thrown a bath towel over his shoulder, his back to Harry as he padded towards the bathroom.
Harry bit back the tart ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ that was sitting on his tongue just in time, and instead let his gaze follow Louis’ short trek, barely catching the soft, exhausted, “I’m gonna take a shower. Go ahead to breakfast if you’re hungry,” that he breathed over his shoulder.
The thing about Harry was, while comprehending a hint was no problem, taking it – especially when he didn’t actually want to – was another thing altogether. Bolstered by his still simmering ire, he straightened his spine and waited for Louis to twist around enough to catch his eye. Then, he said, words crisp and clear, “That’s okay. I’ll wait for you.”
And, credit where credit was due: the sag of Louis’ shoulders was so minute that only someone who had spent the better part of twenty years learning every infinitesimal change in his mood could have possibly noticed.
“Great.”
It was really more verbal eye roll than word at that point, slipping past the bathroom door just before it slid closed solidly between them.
And as trite as it was, it seemed like the more things changed, the more they really did stay the same, because if Harry Styles always had to win, well then, Louis Tomlinson was certainly never one to make it easy.
In the five minutes that had passed since Louis had entered the en-suite, the furrow in Harry’s brow still had yet to fade. In fact, he was almost definitely developing a slight headache from the way his eyes remained narrowed at the closed door, his arms crossed resolutely over his chest.
‘You still always have to win, huh?’
Just the memory of those words were enough to have Harry’s lip curled up in a snarl. Feeling the annoyance starting to curdle again, Harry found himself mimicking Louis’ accusation in a ridiculously petulant (but nonetheless tonally accurate) babble under his breath.
“Meh meh meh-meh meh meh meh, meh? No,” he defended staunchly to the empty room. “I just don’t come up with half a bloody plan and then stake an entire career on it. Wanker.”
