thank you @so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed for the tag 🧡
snippet from second-hand emotion since I don't have much to share from the current WIP :')
He jerks awake when something soft pokes at the inside of his cheek. He closes his mouth around fur and sputters.
The cat in question pokes him in the eye in a silent request — wake up, bitch. Poke. Poke.
His spine tells him he’s been out for the rest of the night, carefully put on a pillow on the couch that slipped to the ground. The wintery darkness outside isn’t so helpful in telling time as the third episode of House ’s season two.
More out of routine than will, he rocks to his feet, dropping the cat to the floor in the process. His arms fling forward — “crap!” — catch her, but the cat is fine. She always is. She hisses warningly and makes a beeline for tap water, and Harry wonders yet again when did she even learn to open the water in the tap.
He checks the windows and the door. All locked. His mom’s not back yet, Niall’s gone. He notes the end of snowfall when Louis walks into the living room. His bedhead isn’t as funny as always, and neither is his strangely composed yet sloppy morning walk. Nothing is like what it used to be and that makes Harry’s guts twist all of a sudden.
“Hazza.” Louis’ sunk eyes are awake and lidded with an apology.
He approaches Harry guardedly, like he’s drawing near a wounded animal, like Harry’s is something wild and hurt, lying against a tree. Hell, maybe he is, but he’s not the only one. It takes a moment for him to realize his shoulders are hunched and his arms are folded firmly on his chest. He does look like a hyena with a battle scar.
His eyes follow Louis as he moves.
Another step, a third. His hand wraps around Harry’s wrist.
Logically, it shouldn’t be a heartache play button, but it is. The hollowed-in cheeks, the eyes with outer corner drooping and swimming right into the dark shades under the glassy cyan lakes, the remorse drawn on the eyebrows. All of that is tackling Harry’s impassiveness away.
His mouth quivers but that’s all he gives the boy. He’s still not the one to blame and say sorry.
Louis’ other hand wanders to Harry’s jaw. His teeth sink into the already abused lower lip.
“It’s easy to love you on beautiful days, you know?” he starts and swallows, his Adam’s apple bobbing and getting the entirety of Harry’s attention for a couple of seconds. “And now that the world crumbled under your feet and hope has run out of sight, I… I just left you to yourself. More than that, I blamed you for it all. It’s like blaming the meteorologist for saying there’ll be an earthquake in Croatia, and…” He swallows, eyes tracking his finger as it swirls the disgustingly dirty hair falling on Harry's forehead. “Not wanting to lose you makes me an awful person. I wish I didn’t need so much of you, but I do.” He swipes a fingertip above Harry’s cheekbone and locks their eyes. “All I want is to love you, and to be loved by you. As long as I can. If you let me.”
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