Archive of Our Own

Louis quite possibly hates this pool more than anything else on God’s perpetually grey Earth. The paint’s peeling off the walls, years of tepid water and questionable chemicals apparently have that effect, no-running-no-diving-no-having-fun-ever signs attached to the wall with nothing but a rusty nail and sheer willpower. Kids areshrieking, louder than usual or possibly just giving that impression on account of the hangover nestled into the backblocks of his brain (drinking alone, Louis has decided recently, is fine, so long as it’s wine.) It’s unbearably warm, and he’d complain, really he would, but the alternative is being put on outdoor pool duty and that’s possibly worse. Because heaven help them all, despite it being more or less freezing, there are a select group of geriatrics and halfway-wealthy housewives who come to do their laps rain, hail or shine, and David Cameron’s apparently not got around to passing an adults don’t really need supervision in a pool bill yet, so it is occasionally his lot in life to watch them. For hours.

This is his life now. He has dropped out of college to come and work nine to five as a lifeguard at a community pool in Manchester and attempt to hold his family together armed with nothing but a fair-to-middling wit and two years of an art history degree. And if that’s not the most depressing thing he’s ever heard, he really might as well just not bother getting up in the morning.

“Mum is such a fucking bitch, Lou, you know I’m right.”

And, right, his sister is still on the line. He amends his first thought upon walking in here for another day doing absolutely shit all with his life – this pool is his second most hated thing on the planet. His sisters being bratty little self-entitled children is number one, most definitely.

Louis sighs, stands just outside the locker room and rolls his eyes as he hitches his bag up on his shoulder. He starts in ten minutes, and he’s quite sure it will only be by divine intervention that he doesn’t kill her in that time.

“C’mon,” he says, every bit the authoritative five-years-her-senior brother that he can muster, “don’t be like that. That’s not fair, she’s having a rough time, she’s doing her best.”

“I don’t care. I have places to go on Saturday, you know, I don’t want to sit around babysitting for free.”

What Louis wants to say is, well sorry, you ungrateful arsehole, that she can’t afford to pay you twenty quid an hour on a single nurse’s salary to sit on the couch and yell at your sisters. What he wants to say possibly more than that is I’m asking you to do this for one fucking night while she works late so I can go and have four hours of fun, the least you could do is complain to someone who’s not me.

Instead, he just sighs again, closes his eyes for a long moment before opening them.

“I have to go to work,” he says down the line, “do me a favour and be half decent to her when you get home from school, okay?”

He can almost hear the eyeroll before she hangs up without a goodbye, and briefly wonders if he was this charming at sixteen.

“Louis!”

He turns from the door of a changeroom with a smile as Niall jogs over, grinning in that affably lovely way he always does.

“Hey, mate,” he says, a little out of breath, “good weekend?”

All in all, really, it wasn’t. His mother was upset and his sisters were either bratty or ill or both and Zayn threw what sounded like a fun party that he didn’t get to go to, on account of the former two issues taking up his entire forty-eight hours. But Niall’s one of his favourite people in the world and having him look all concerned makes Louis want to jump in the deep end with stones in his pocket, so he just rolls his eyes and shrugs as they walk inside.

“Not so bad,” he says, running his fingers through his hair in the mirror, “you? How was Zayn’s?”

Niall shrugs, perches himself up on the counter lazily as Louis rifles through his bag, pulls out his red board shorts and dumb whistle, which he presumably has to wear to make this seem like an actual lifeguard job somewhere where people actually might drown, and not a crappy pool complex in the middle of a landlocked city.

“Good!” Niall says, “you know, the usual. Zayn took a nice girl home, Liam went back to a nice girl’s place, Aiden and Matt got off in the laundry.”

Louis snorts, throws his shirt and hoodie in his bag and leans back on the wall, spinning his whistle idly in his hand.

“And?” he says, raising his eyebrows, “what about you, hm?”

Niall smirks.

“I made fucking brilliant cocktails and won four games of pool.”

They both laugh; it’s a long running joke between the four of them that Liam and Zayn get laid every other night while for Niall and Louis, well, it’s been a while, to say the least. Louis has an excuse, though, because most Saturday nights he’s sat on his Mum’s bed sharing her Häagen-Dazs or testing Charlotte on GCSE History. He’s quite sure Niall is just lazy.

“You’re telling me there wasn’t one person there who you could muster up the energy to snog in the back room?”

Niall shrugs, hops off the counter and shakes his hair out a little, glances at the time on his phone.

“Sure,” he says, “snogged two of ‘em, actually.”

“Well that counts!” Louis protests, “you know. Sort of. You’re leaving me behind, Horan, I’m gonna have to find someone new to be bitterly lonely with.”

Niall rolls his eyes, starts for the door now that Louis’ finished getting changed. It’s coming up on ten and he’s no doubt got a group of hydrophobic preschoolers to coax into the water and teach to hold a board and kick their legs all at once. As someone who watches this play out every other day, Louis can testify that it’s a lot harder than it sounds.

“Nah mate, don’t think so,” he says, “was that cute girl from my English class and then that guy who works at Largo on Fridays.”

“And?” Louis asks, looping his whistle round his neck and thanking God once again that he’s inside today, and not half naked manning the outdoor pool, becausefuck, it looks cold.

“And they ended up going home together,” Niall says, smile sort of apathetically despairing, and Louis can’t help but laugh, getting a well deserved shove for his outburst.

“Fuck you,” Niall laughs, “it’s not funny! I’m gonna die bitter and lonely and you’re the one who’s gonna have to—“

Louis’ busy switching his phone off as Niall begins his loneliness diatribe, so it takes him a few seconds to realise that he’s cut himself off, and is turning between wherever he’s looking and Louis like he’s just lost some of his brain function.

“You know,” Louis says, quickly responding to a text from his mother, “typically if you’re about to teach four-year-olds how to stay afloat, you should probably be able to string a sentence togeth—“

“Who the fuck,” Niall hisses, “is that?”

And when Louis looks up, well, if it weren’t for the constant echoing of helicopter parents and dull chlorine smell which Louis’ sure is going to come back to bite him in twenty years, he would hazard a guess and say he might just be at the pearly gates of paradise. Because possibly the most attractive boy this side of the equator is standing, half naked in what looks to be a very new pair of regulation red board shorts, about the width of a pool and four feet away from him.

Louis’ quite sure he’s going to pass out, crack his head on the tiles, and promptly die, and it’s all going to be the fault of the very tall, very pretty, and veryendearingly tattooed boy leaning on the counter and laughing with whoever’s working the desk.

“I’ve no idea,” he says back, quite aware they’re staring like two fifteen year old girls visiting their brother school, “oh my God, Niall.”

“Fuck off,” Niall says immediately, “I call him hands fuckin’ down. I saw him first.”

Louis just snorts, runs a hand through his hair because either the humidity in here’s become un-fucking-bearable or this boy really is raising his body temperature.

“You say that about every new employee we get,” Louis says dryly, eliciting a split second glare from Niall before he turns right back. Niall’s leaning on the lifeguard’s chair, hands in his pockets as he eyes this boy off, Louis stands next to him, water overflowing from the pool and lapping at his feet absently. “But you don’t even like tattoos anyway, so sod off.”

“What are you talking about, you moron,” Niall mutters, “not the one that looks like he’s just walked out of a henna stall at a fair, Louis, the one next to him.”

It is when Louis refixes his gaze on the other entirely good looking boy, but decidedly nowhere near as gorgeous as the object of Louis’ five minutes of desire, that Tattoos lifts his head, looks across the pool to Niall and Louis and smiles slowly, gives a little wave.

“Oh, Jesus,” Louis says, dropping his gaze the same instant as Niall, so pitifully in sync like a bad comedy, it’s only a matter of time before Adam Sandler jumps out dressed as his mother, or whatever, “did he just see us?”

“Think so,” Niall says, risking a glance back up, “oh Lou, oh no, they’re coming over here.”

Louis is really overly convinced that this is going to be the last experience of his life. He can’t do this. He can barely manage to make his toast properly in the morning these days. Conversing with someone who is not only criminally tanned for this time of year, hair pretty and softly curly and fucking tattooed like that, but is also apparently his new coworker, is not on Louis’ definitive list of Things I Can Manage To Do Today.

It turns out, he doesn’t have a lot of choice, because the two of them are walking round the diving blocks and are approximately five seconds away.

“Game face, Tommo,” Niall mutters, before his face breaks out into that ever-charming grin and he nods at them, beckons them over.

“Hey!” he calls out, over the noise of the pool, “haven’t seen you too round before!”

Both of the boys smile, and Tattoos shakes his hair out, grins.

“Nah,” he says, “no, I’m new, so’s…Justin, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, Justin,” he says, grinning and shaking Niall’s hand affably, and Louis suppresses a laugh because this goddamned boy has an accent that Niall’s going to die for, “I’m new to all this, actually, just got to Manchester last week. ‘M’on exchange, for school.”

“Oh yeah?” Niall says, his voice a fraction higher then usual before he clears his throat and digs his heel into Louis’ foot for moral support, “that’s cool man, how’re you finding it?”

They start talking like they’ve been friends for years, obligatory, are you Irish? Oh dude, that’s so cool, I went there when I was a kid and so how come you’re working at this place, then filling the conversation. How Niall manages to form friendships in less than a hundred words is a concept both mysterious and impressive to Louis’ cynical inner workings, and it’s as he’s thinking this that he realises the loveliest looking person he’s seen in over a year (Zayn’s going to hate that) is standing there a little awkwardly in front of him.

Probably, Louis thinks, he should speak. Say, hi, or, well, these two seemed to hit it off, probably he should say something funny about the pool or give him a friendly warning about how shitty this job is, something like that.

Probably.

Instead, his brain short circuits, and he just about chokes on his own spit.

“You have a lot of tattoos,” he blurts out, and immediately tries to triangulate where the closest pit of despair is to his current location so he can go and have a wallow in his break. He watches a lot of SVU; it is one of the many potentially damaging side effects of spending most of his time with a middle-aged woman.

The boy just laughs though, runs a hand a little self-consciously down his bicep. Louis wants to die. He has a very nice bicep. A tear-inducingly nice bicep.

“Yeah, I guess so,” he says with a small smile, before winking, “Diversion tactics. Means you don’t notice the extra nipples.”

“The what?” Louis half shouts, trying valiantly to stop himself raking his eyes over his torso like a lion eyeing off a baby gazelle.

“Extra nipples,” the boy laughs again, raising his hands and casting a gaze down his own body, and God fucking damn it but Louis’ found his pit of despair, it’s located on this Satanic creature’s left cheek, it’s a dimple, “serious, look.”

This is the strangest conversation Louis’ ever been a part of, and he has stumbled in on no less than two father figures cheating on his mother with one of her closest friends, had four awkward auditions for drama schools in London and was outed, somewhat unintentionally, by his sister to his entire family at Christmas lunch when he was eighteen. This takes the cake, and the next few out of the oven too.

He does, upon closer inspection, indeed have two extra nipples, although Louis thinks they look more like freckles. Maybe they’re souvenirs from the fountain of youth and vitality and charm from whence he came, like the stamp in Louis’ passport from visiting Liam on exchange in Finland. Louis has no idea what his brain’s doing. Once he’s helped pay this month’s bills and bought his mother something nice for her birthday, he’s investing in a new one. A Louis 2.0, if you will.

(He has no idea what his brain’s doing.)

“Wow,” he says idly, a thousand times more lazily confident and relaxed than he feels, “so if you get another pair d’you get the steak knives?”

The boy laughs, delighted, running a hand through his hair.

“I’m Harry,” he says, “’M’lifeguarding here, apparently.” He looks around dubiously, out the window. “Do I actually have to sit out there all day?”

“Louis,” he replies, “and unfortunately, Harry, yes, that is the lot you’ve drawn in life by coming to work at the Manchester City Community Recreation Facility.”

Harry looks unenthused, to say the least.

“Hey,” Louis says, and he should not be flirting with his coworker of five minutes for a multitude of reasons, but here he is doing it all the same, “if it gets below freezing, I’ll bring you a cuppa.”

He smiles, shakes his head and looks at Louis for a long time. He is cute. He is extremely fucking cute and also this weird infusion of jaw (pants) droppingly hot, and Louis’ suddenly got something a lot better to look at while he works than that one kid who stands in the shallow end every Wednesday and pisses in the pool.

“Well thank you,” he says, “and if it gets any warmer in here I’m totally up for throwing you in the deep end.”

Louis’ going to throw himself off the ten-metre diving board if this guy doesn’t shut the fuck up.

“Sounds good,” he says with a smile, before clapping Niall on the shoulder, “c’mon, I think your class is lined up over there.”

“Oh,” Niall says miserably, “yeah, alright. Where the fuck’s Josh, he was meant to be taking it with me.”

“Oh!” Canada pipes up, Louis can’t remember his name, John or Jack or, oh, Justin, there it is, “the under-4’s? I think I’m taking that with you, man.”

Niall looks like he’s just crossed over into the afterlife.

“Brilliant,” he says, flicking Louis a look that says halle-fucking-julah as Justin stretches idly, “we should go over, then. See you two at lunch, yeah?” he says, and with Louis and Harry’s nods firmly his, he motions at Niall to follow him over to the stairs.

They watch as the two of them do a big goofy hello for the kids, high fiving them all as they gingerly step in one by one and cling onto the side for dear life.

“So,” Harry says, throwing a towel over his shoulder, whistle hanging out of his mouth, “see you soon, yeah?”

Louis blinks. “Yeah,” he says, “enjoy your Arctic adventure.”

Harry laughs, winks, and gives a little toot of his whistle, before walking to the door and pushing it open, cold draught flowing in for a few seconds.

Louis climbs the few stairs to his chair and collapses into it, and comes to the conclusion that he no longer has the mental capacity to save a drowning infant today.

**

For someone with quite literally no time on his hands, Louis manages to find a lot of hours over the next week to think about Harry the new lifeguard with his nice abs and even nicer laugh and quite possibly devilish voice. He finds many a spare five minutes to saunter outside and brace the freezing cold and chat with Harry before being herded back inside to deal with a goggles debacle, or some such shit. If he offers to show Harry how to lock up all the equipment at the end of the day, or makes sure that the roster in the coming weeks has them both inside, or spends an inordinate amount of time laughing with him over strictly-too-leisurely lunches over his next four shifts, it’s not a big deal.

Or something.

He also, incidentally, spends a lot of time wondering if being half naked around his coworkers is a blessing or a curse. Louis is apparently working in supernatural metaphors this week, which is something he’s just going to have to deal with.

There’s quite a lot to deal with, actually. There’s his mother being stoically miserable as it comes up on her would-have-been wedding anniversary, his two older sisters being absolutely fucking vile to her and the twins just being petulant, the apparent modus operandi of nine year olds. There is work and dinner to make and homework to supervise and Louis’ going out of his mind, quite honestly. Has been since he moved back in to help out with things a year or so ago, but it seems more intense of late. More head-to-wall-until-it-bleeds fucking frustrating because he loves them all to death but he had kind of figured this particular chapter of his life was going to end along with high school and inconveniently placed zits and pretending to enjoy sex with girls.

There is, unfortunately, no over the counter cream or any amount of soul searching that gets rid of the selfish and quite frankly cuntish scar of infidelity from all of their lives, though, so. Here he is. Twenty-one and out of college, living at home and contributing a fair chunk of his pitiful salary to getting everyone back on their feet.

He takes a deep breath, and drains the pasta.

“Dinner’s up!” he yells out the door of the kitchen, and is met with four more-or-less cannon coming, Lou’s before the general rumble of feet comes down the stairs.

“M’fucking starving,” Felicite says as she walks in and grabs a bowl, and Louis nudges her with his hip.

“Don’t swear,” he says, “don’t eat in front of the TV, either, sit in here like normal people.”

Charlotte rolls her eyes but takes a seat at the table anyway, dumps a small cow’s worth of cheese on her pasta. The twins are sweet, give him a big smile and a hug to say thank you, and he kind of wants to freeze them in time right here before they turn into smaller, matching versions of their older sisters.

“Hey, so I’m going out,” he says, throwing the dishes in the dishwasher and wiping his hands on his jeans, “Mum’ll be home about nine thirty, make sure the two of you are in bed before she walks in,” he finishes, gesturing at Daisy and Phoebe.

“Where you going, Lou?” Charlotte grins over her fork, waggling her eyebrows like the little shit that she is, “hot date?”

It is at that precise moment that the front door opens, and the girls all start to attention.

“Secure, Lou, really,” Zayn calls through the hall, making his way to the kitchen. Louis just rolls his eyes at Fliss who’s face has hit that shade of there’s a hot boy in my house and I’m sat here eating pasta in my sweats at the sound of his voice.

“The hottest,” he says dryly, just as Zayn walks in.

“Hey!” he says brightly, face breaking into a grin as he pulls Louis in for a hug. He’s in sinfully tight jeans and obviously hasn’t shaved in a few days, and it’s all rather uncomfortable to see how his teenage sisters go from lazily eating dinner on a Friday night to, like, people, in about six seconds flat.

“Never let it go a week without seeing me again,” Zayn reprimands into his shoulder, before smiling at the girls and stealing a piece of penne from the middle of the table, “how’re you going, guys?”

“Good,” they chirp back, and Louis grimaces, pushes Zayn firmly out the kitchen door.

“We’re leaving before you turn everyone in this house into a puddle,” he says begrudgingly, and Zayn just laughs.

“Even you, Lou?” Zayn smirks.

“Forever and always,” Louis shoots back, before turning back to the table, “don’t forget, nine thirty, okay, or she’ll have all our heads.”

Charlotte just rolls her eyes, shoos him off with one hand. “Go and have fun,” she says, “see you tomorrow, Lou.”

With her blessing, and the briefest of clues that she perhaps is somewhat human underneath the layers of teen angst and whatever-the-fuck else, he smacks a kiss on all their heads and is out the door in record time. Zayn’s already stood out on the balcony, looking up at the sky as Louis comes out.

“You ready, mate?” he asks, unlocking the car over the road as they walk. They’re only going to go back to his place, it’s nothing special, but he seems to instinctively get Louis’ need to escape that house from time to time – he grew up with a brood of siblings, too – and is always more than happy to swing by and pick him up. Quite possibly it’s because he thinks he looks very interesting and urban-grime in his new car, but Louis’ll take it.

“Fuck, yes,” he mutters, running a hand through his hair, “thank you, by the way. Y’know.”

He doesn’t need to say anymore, Zayn just nods and loops an arm round his shoulders, pulls him in for a grin.

“How’s the mad house treating you then, hm?” he asks, letting go of Louis as he walks round the hood of the car to the passenger seat.

“You know, I never thought I’d say this, but I’m fairly sure college was quieter than that house,” he says as he leans back in the seat, car starting as he sighs, “like. Fuck, Zayn, can you imagine if she’d stayed in Doncaster and I’d had to’ve move back there?”

“No,” he says simply, “wouldn’t’ve let you. Miss you too much.”

Louis smiles at that, flicks the radio on.

“S’very romantic of you, darling,” he coos, “you say that to all the girls?”

“Only the ones coming back to my place,” Zayn winks over at him, “no, seriously, how’re you going?”

Louis sighs again. “Fine,” he says, “like. It’s whatever, y’know. How’s classes?”

“Good,” Zayn says gently, “fine. Nothing’s changed, it’s the same place and the same shitty professors and same house beer. You’re not missing much.”

Louis smiles, wishes he could believe that. He fucking loves him for trying, though.

“So Niall’s apparently head over for some American boy at the pool, then?” Zayn says, changing the topic, and Louis relaxes a little, “said he’s fit and everything.”

“He’s Canadian,” Louis says, rolling his eyes at Niall’s apparent inability to differentiate people’s places of origin further than Ireland and not-Ireland, “but yes. They teach fuckin’ preschoolers together and everything, it’s all very Katherine Heigl and Paul Rudd star in a charming little story with lots of swearing.”

Zayn smiles, goes a little faster to chase the light.

“And,” he prompts, and Louis furrows his brow.

“And, I dunno, his name’s Justin or something and he’s pretty much Niall’s type to a tee and I’m probably going to walk in on them fucking in the paddling—“

“No, you moron, shut up,” Zayn says, “I mean and apparently there’s someone else new there too. Or so I’ve been told,” he says dryly, “word on the street is you’re watching him more than the vulnerable swimmers of the greater Manchester area.”

“Fuck you,” Louis protests, “drive your goddamned car, Malik, I need a drink in the next five minutes or I’m gonna cry.”

Zayn, who Louis is steadily growing to resent the longer this car trip wears on, does no such thing. In fact, he pulls right into the curb, stops the car and turns to Louis with unimpressed eyebrows.

“Tell me his name,” he says coolly, enjoying this far too much for Louis to tolerate.

“His name is fuck you drive your dumb car,” Louis says sullenly, looking steadfastly ahead.

“So he is real, then,” Zayn says gleefully, “I owe Niall five quid. Fuck. Seriously, tell me.”

“Zayn, can we get back on the road, ple—“

“Tell me,” Zayn sing song loudly, grabbing at Louis’ cheek like he’s his grandmother, and really, Louis is not here for this at all.

“Shut up,” he says, batting him away, “you’re worse than my moth—“

“Tell me!” he says louder, slapping Louis rather indelicately on the side of the head.

“Zayn,” Louis yells, slapping him right back, “you’re a fucking—“

“Tell me,” he says, and Louis cops another hand to the head before he groans and pushes him away.

“His name is Harry and he has some nice tattoos and he’s a charming fucking demon sent to ruin my purity,” Louis says, loud and exasperated.

The car is, of course, now completely quiet, because Zayn can play him like a goddamned fiddle.

Zayn smirks, starts the car again.

“Thank you, darling,” he says, smile obnoxious and wide, and Louis collapses rather ungraciously onto the dashboard.

**

Louis is feeling particularly resentful come Monday. He resents his mother for leaving him to do the school run this morning, he resents the concoction of chemicals dumped in this pool that he’s fairly sure are carcinogenic for ruining his hair, and he resents Niall for the general aura of happy and relaxed he’s exuding. Not really, though, because the bastard makes it very difficult to feel anything but fondly endeared towards him.

Then he sees Harry bent down and earnestly chatting with a tearful four-year-old who’s lost her mother, before taking her hand and walking over to the PA to make an announcement, giving her a lollipop while they wait, and any sense of endearment Louis has felt to anyone ever goes out the window.

Louis resents Mother Teresa and Gandhi and Good King fucking Wenceslas at this moment in his life, and as he chews his chips rather aggressively at lunch, he’s apparently not keeping that quite as under wraps as he would’ve liked.

“Lou,” Niall says warily, picking a chip off his plate, “you okay, mate?”

Louis sighs sulkily, resentment reignited by the fact that there is not enough chicken salt on his death-on-a-plate.

“I’m fine,” he says, glaring darkly in the general direction of the world before snapping out of it, “what’s the deal with you, anyway? Why’re you all perky?”

Niall smiles, blushes darker than the puddle of crappy tomato sauce on his plate, and Louis rolls his eyes.

“What?” he asks, “did Canada propose, or something?”

Niall kicks him under the table.

“No,” he says, “and his name’s Justin, Lou. No. But he was at the bar I played this weekend.”

Louis’ eyebrows shoot up in spite of himself, he’s never been one to resist a bit of gossip.

“Did you invite him?”

Niall shakes his head, rolls his eyes. “He claims he didn’t know I was on,” he says, “but he’s in Liam’s chem class and I saw them hanging out the other day, so I’m pretty sure he told him. Still,” he grins, “not bad, is it?”

“Not bad at all,” Louis says, impressed, “how do you do that?”

“What?”

He gestures vaguely at nothing in particular. “That,” he says, “y’know. Just think, hey, you’re pretty fit, let me play guitar for you, fantastic, done deal.”

Niall snorts and takes a swig of his Sprite, shrugs.

“Dunno, man, s’not that hard. He was so nice about it though. Invited me over to play with him one time, so,” he beams, “pretty good weekend, all up.”

Louis opens his mouth to agree when, somewhat out of nowhere – which only serves to further convince Louis that he’s an ethereal being – Harry appears at their table, a little out of breath.

“Hi,” he says, “sorry to interrupt, or whatever, but, umm. There’s a kid? Like? Pissing in the pool?”

Louis doesn’t mean to laugh, really, he doesn’t. But Harry’s face is the image of sacrosanct concern, as though there’s a North Korean missile heading their way instead of an incontinent infant, and it’s just too good.

“Oh, Harold,” Louis says once he’s regained control of himself, “that is a thing that we steadfastly ignore and let the dissolved horse tranquilizers running through the water take care of.”

Harry wrinkles his nose.

“You sure?” he asks, and Louis just nods, his smile sinfully enamoured, he can feel it on his own face, “s’pretty disgusting.”

“Yeah, trust me, it’s not a big deal,” he says with a laugh, “thank you, though, for checking.”

Harry smiles at that, gives a little laugh and squeezes Louis shoulder.

“Right,” he says, tousling his own hair a little embarrassedly, “cheers, Lou, thanks.”

He walks off, and Louis’ sure he’s turned positively gelatinous under his touch.

“Speaking of new boys,” Niall says, a little too smug for Louis’ liking, “Harry’s quite easy on the eye, don’t you think?”

“No,” Louis says immediately, “as a matter of fact, in the last couple of weeks of seeing him shirtlessly charm his way round the pool the thought has never crossed my mind.”

Niall blinks, expectant.

“Yes, you idiot, he’s fucking gorgeous,” Louis concedes, “you happy now?”

“You know he asked me for your number last week,” Niall says, and Louis just about completes the transformation from human to jelly to bona fide liquid right then and there, “I covered a Saturday shift with him, and he asked for it.”

“Well did you give it to him?!” Louis splutters, and Niall nods, the very image of satisfied matchmaker.

“Niall,” he hisses, “you can’t do that. You’re not my pimp, you know.”

“What! Louis. You’ve stared at nobody else for a week. Talk to him! Least you get’s a nice dinner and a fun kiss, if his mouth’s anything to go by. Or you get a shag. Or you get an actual boyfriend, which frankly, mate, you could use.”

Louis kicks him, hard, in the shin. “Says you,” he points out, not unfairly, and Niall rolls his eyes.

“S’not about me,” he says, “I’m just saying. Go for it.”

Louis manages to pull himself back into enough of a solid organism to glare at Niall and finish his chips.

**

Usually, at the two week mark of knowing someone as attractive and outrageously teasing as Harry Styles (this is his full name, according to the staff roster, short and cool without anything cumbersome and long in the middle, and Louis doesn’t believe it on principle), Louis would be really, really enjoying this. Despite a lifetime’s worth of letdowns and subpar relationships great and small crammed into twenty-one years, Louis likes people. He likes getting to know them and teasing them and dating them and fucking them, and he especially likes it when they happen to be as good looking and genuinely lovely as Harry seems to be.

So. Usually, it’d be great.

Not this time, though, because somewhat fucking frustratingly, he barely has time to remember to breathe before his mother all but crumbles around him.

His mum is his favourite person on the planet, cringe-inducingly uncool as that may be. Really, she is; she’s wonderful and utterly selfless and everything that Louis hopes he’ll be when he’s a parent and a professional and whatever else in between. She’s had an unimaginably and unfairly shitty life for someone who he genuinely struggles to find fault in, and so if she needs him, he’s going to be here. The girls are young and in school and have a million other things going, and well. This is what he dropped out and moved back in with them to do. So. He’s going to do it.

He just kind of wishes that this date, the first anniversary without He-who-shall-not-be-named there, didn’t have to pop up right fucking now. Because when Niall texts him LOUIS FUCK GET TO LARGO RIGHT NOW MATE HARRY’S HERE XXXX, he can’t go, because he’s gently prising an old photo album away from her and helping Fliss with an art assignment. When Zayn calls him to say that Liam introduced he and Harry at lunch that day and that he is so fucking hot mate, get in there before I do, and oh by the way he’s popping by our place tonight to study with Liam, Louis can’t make an entirely unplanned and coincidental drop in, because she’s just so sad and he can’t leave her like that.

And it’s just. He’s not bitter, he’s not angry, he quite seriously doesn’t mind taking a year or two off school and helping out, because his mother has been nothing but utterly brilliant and supportive of him for over two decades, and it’s kind of the least he could do. It’s just that it would be really great if he could have fun, do this one thing, enjoy the company of this surprisingly wonderful coworker, without feeling an Atlas-worthy amount of guilt fall onto his shoulders.

By the time the fourth Sunday of the month rolls around, Louis hasn’t been anywhere but work and home for weeks now, and he can slowly feel the cells in his brain crying for an out. Luckily, he supposes, there is one date in his non-existent calendar that is unmissable; the very lame and very cheap lunch date that he, Niall, Zayn and Liam keep regardless of whatever might be going on in any other facet of their lives.

Miss it and there will be punishment is the general rule, and despite it making them sound like a high school clique a-la Every Shitty Teen Film Ever, it also makes Louis go out and interact with the people he loves more than almost anyone on the planet, so. He’ll take it.

‘This place is a rip off joint,” Liam announces as they sit down, big chalkboard menu significantly inflated from this time a month ago.

“It’s a pub, mate, it doesn’t get any cheaper.”

Liam shoots a reproachful glare at Niall before turning to Zayn, and Louis realises in that moment how much he misses these morons when he’s not around them.

“What are you getting?” Liam asks, “I’ll just eat your chips.”

Zayn shrugs, seems okay with the eternally tight-arsed behaviour of his best mate.

“Steak, I think,” he muses, pondering the menu, “steak or a schnitzel.”

“You’re a vegetarian,” the three of them drone in unison, and it seems to take Zayn by surprise, although he manages to flip them all of anyway.

“Hey!” he says, “no, actually, I just try not to eat meat, when it’s possible.”

“Well you could get a veggie burger,” Louis points out; he enjoys this particular conversation a little too much.

Zayn blinks at him. “Well yeah,” he says, preemptively glaring at him, “but—“

“So really,” Louis interrupts loudly, grinning at him, “you’re a selective vegetarian, then. You just eat meat when you feel like it.”

“You’re such a cu—“

“One may even say, Zayn,” he says, leaning forward, Niall and Liam looking at Zayn with smug as shit little grins to back Louis up, “that you, my friend, are anomnivore. Can you imagine that?”

Zayn considers this for a moment, before kicking him soundly in the shin.

“Whatever,” he mutters, much to the delight of the rest of them, “you’re the worst people in the world, I don’t know why I come here, you know.”

Niall sighs, leans across the table to smile right in his face.

“Because you love us,” he says with a sigh, and Zayn breaks into a grin, slaps a kiss on his cheek and pushes him away.

With that settled, and Louis quite convinced he is friends with the most homoerotic group of straight-or-mostly-straight-unless-there-is-a-cute-Canadian-or-bartender boys the world has ever seen, they settle in with average chicken parmas and their monthly tales of not-quite-woe with a jug of beer between them.

“How’re you, anyway, Lou?” Liam asks him across the table. Niall and Zayn are locked into a very serious discussion about rap or where they’re going to stay in LA over summer or possibly the Beatles versus the Stones – Louis lost track topics ago, and by the looks of things, Liam too – and the sun’s just setting behind them. Never let it be said the four of them can’t lunch like middle-aged women, Louis thinks.

He smiles, sits back in the booth with a sigh. Liam, possibly more than the other two, gets this. His dad left when he was a kid, and while Louis wouldn’t trade in Niall’s drink yourself under the table method of stress relief, or Zayn’s let’s listen to Frank Ocean and smoke pensively route for the world, sometimes it’s just nice to have someone who gets it.

He shrugs, noncommittal.

“You know,” he smiles, a little tired, “the usual. Anniversary and all that this week.”

Liam winces, takes a sip of his beer.

“M’sorry, mate,” he says, “that’s the worst. You know my mum’s always up for taking her out for dinner, right, she’s always fuckin’ calling me to tell you—“

“Louis?”

And it is, of course, as Louis is sleepily lolled back in a bar room booth with a warm beer in his hand, tomato sauce stain on his shirt, that Satan himself walks in, cheeks windblown and hair Louis could get lost in sort of prettily swept to the side.

Louis’ about seventy percent sure he doesn’t rest his chin on his hands and sigh.

“Hey, Lou,” Harry says with a grin, shivering slightly as he comes inside. Louis is very focused on not swallowing his own tongue at the nickname, and on not slapping all of his friends to keep talking because they’ve fallen deathly silent, as though the captain of the football team’s walked over to entertain this apparent gaggle of cheerleaders.

Louis isn’t sure when he ended up back in high school, then again, he’s not even sure what he just ate was strictly chicken, either, so. Mysteries of life and all that.

“Well fancy seeing you here,” he smiles, Harry’s eyes bright and surprised, “what brings you to possibly the shittiest bar in this whole city of a Sunday?”

“I work across the road on the weekend,” he says, gesturing to a sufficiently cool and urban looking clothes store, “come in and get a pint afterwards, y’know, I like a good reward.”

He laughs a little at himself there, and Louis realises quite circumspectly that one day that giggle is going to hit him unexpectedly and he will require a triple bypass and years of intensive therapy to recover.

“Harry!” Niall yells, finally looking up from the very serious diagram of God-knows-what Zayn’s made with the sugar packets on the table, “fuck, mate, didn’t know you were here! Grab a seat!”

Louis will slowly and cruelly end Niall one day, starting with fucking the roster up for this week and putting him on outdoor, without his foreign loverboy and without a key to get back inside.

“Cheers,” he says, “sorry, have I interrupted something?”

“No,” Zayn says, rolling his eyes, so eternally put upon, “we’re just being pathetic. This is the monthly meeting of the apathetic as shit club of pipe dreams and assorted other wank, please join us.”

“Hey, I’m in,” Harry says, “just gonna grab a drink. Can I get you anything?”

Harry is looking right at him as he asks. He supposes it’s a question directed to the four of them, but the little smile playing across Harry’s face is just maybe only for Louis.

“No,” he chokes out, remarkably smooth for someone who feels as if their organs are being tied into a festive bow, “I’m-- we’re fine, thanks, mate.”

Harry saunters off to go and get a drink, and Louis feels somewhat hysterical.

The others don’t say a word, but there is a distinctive eyebrow raise doing the rounds that Louis feels very much the recipient of.

Fuckers.

“Don’t say a word,” he warns them, and is met with three very defensive looks.

“We’re not doing anything, Lou,” Zayn smirks, “we’re just sitting idly by and watching true lo—“

“Shut up, he’s coming back,” Louis mutters, smiling to make it seem like he’s not about to disembowel his dearest friends as Harry walks back over.

“Hey,” Harry says, sitting down, “so I was talking to one of the bartenders up there, they say you play here sometimes, mate.” He smiles at Niall, takes a pretzel, “That’s so cool, man, you should tell me when you’re on next.”

Niall turns an endearing shade of red, laughs a little.

“Oh,” he says, “I mean, it’s a pretty small thing, you know, just me and these three and whoever’s here, but yeah, thanks, mate. I’m on on the seventh.”

Harry nods, taps it into his phone. “So you guys come too?” he asks, and again, he’s looking fucking straight at Louis, eyes interested and disgustingly lovely, and this is how it must feel to slowly lose your mind, Louis thinks.

“Yeah,” he says, not breaking eye contact, not even when Zayn kicks him to speak, “yeah, y’know, we—“

Louis will never understand why Apple thought it necessary, holed up in their little lab of technological dreams or wherever the fuck, for their vibrate function to be akin to a small earthquake. Apparently there was some pressing need for it, though, because as Louis’ gearing up to be incredibly charming and witty, his phone gives an almighty buzz in the middle of the table, nearly sending his drink over the edge.

“Shit,” he mutters, checking the text, before sighing.

Lou Mum’s going mental, can you come home? It’s ok if you can’t it’s just weird here love you xxx

He guesses his foray back into the real world is cut short.

“Everything alright, mate?” Zayn asks gently, and Louis bites his lip before pocketing his phone and grabbing his keys off the table.

“Yeah,” he says, “I dunno, actually, I think so. But I gotta go.”

He’s met with a general round of outraged cries, which make him smile as he stands.

“Christ, I’m not dying,” he says, rolling his eyes and very much playing the role of insufferably loved very well, “have a fun drunk evening without me,” he pouts.

Liam shoots him a look as they all get up to say bye, a are you sure you’re okay look, which Louis affirms with a little smile and a nod. Zayn throws his arms around him rather aggressively, telling him he’s coming around this week and holding him tight, a little show of solidarity, Louis supposes. He loves them so, so much.

“See you at work, yeah?” Niall asks, handing Louis the last pretzel, and Louis takes it with a grin.

“In all my shirtless glory, yes,” he says with a wink, “see you tomorrow.”

He takes a deep breath, turns to Harry to say bye, but he gets in first.

“I’ll walk you out,” he says, and Louis is too distracted by Zayn throwing his arms up in despair at the offer to contemplate the risk of breaking out into lovely boy-induced hives at Harry’s little display of chivalry.

“Thanks,” Louis says with a smile, “c’mon, let’s go.”

“You sure you’re okay?” Harry asks as they walk, and Louis smiles down at his feet, “I mean. I know, like, I don’t know you that well or whatever, but if you ever wanna blow off some steam, I’m around.”

Louis tries incredibly hard not to think of something else he’d much rather blow, and instead stops at the door, shoots a little smile at Harry.

“Thanks so much, really, that’s sweet,” he says, before raising an eyebrow, “word on the street is you have my number anyway.”

Harry turns a delightful shade of red and looks away, runs a hand through his hair with a little laugh.

“Guess I do, yeah,” he says with a shrug, “that okay?”

Louis laughs, wonders what good works he did in his past life to have been allowed to wander into the path of this stranger. Maybe he built the Tabernacle, or something. Perhaps he was Moses. He supposes that idea falls apart somewhat after a quick perusal of Leviticus, but he’s working with limited brain function.

“I think I’ll manage,” he smiles, “hey, have a good rest of your day, yeah?”

Harry nods, and quite without warning, pulls Louis in for a hug. As an objective third party, Louis can now say with some conviction that Harry Styles is quite a gifted hugger. He’s all warm and nice arms and boy smell and Louis is reminded with startling fucking clarity how easy this is meant to be, how easy it would be to just kiss him on the cheek and tell him to enjoy his afternoon and leave feeling all happy and fifteen-years-old.

He doesn’t do that, though, because there’s something niggling away at him that distinctly says, don’t drag him into all of your bullshit.

“See you later, Harry,” he says, pulling away, and he flashes him a smile as he steps out into the early evening, car across the road.

Harry texts him for the first time after that day. It’s nothing major, a simple Hii, this is your kind of creepy co-worker who might have asked your friend for your number – please don’t have me arrested .x, but Louis just about drops his vanilla latte in the middle of Sainsbury’s as it comes through.

“Who’s it?” Zayn asks, eyebrow raised – he will, Louis is sure, be rewarded in another life for coming grocery shopping with him – and Louis just rolls his eyes and makes Zayn think of something not-dumb to reply with.

They fall into a bit of a thing, and it starts about a week later. Louis’ having a shitty night, the twins are being brats and work was awful and his mother’s working late and the place is in meltdown. The older two are holed up in their rooms, apparently at war with one another, and only emerge to tell the twins to shut the fuck up and Louis is fairly sure that by the time they’re all in bed, he’s going to melt into the floor out of sheer exhaustion and never get up.

That is, until his phone goes off, and he’s crossing his room with surprising agility. He is nothing if not a boy enthusiast, let it be known.

Heyyy, whatcha doing? .x

Louis smiles in spite of himself. It is, strangely, really nice to have someone unknowingly checking up on him.

trying to stop four girls under the age of seventeen mercilessly attacking each other, as it turns out. you? 

It doesn’t take long for the reply to come through – Well then. Shit. I’m just making tea, to be honest, yours sounds a bit more intense. You should put The Voice on, I’m watching it now.

And maybe it’s stupid, maybe it’s a sign that he needs to get back to doing something with his life outside of staring at a twenty-five by eight expanse of water all day, but it makes him feel significantly better after a long and frustrating day. They text back and forth all through the dumb show – Louis doesn’t even like reality TV, then again, he thinks he might be able to get used to nuclear proliferation and Skrillex should they come attached with Harry Styles’ name – and when he falls asleep that night, he’s a hell of a lot happier than when he woke up.

So it becomes a pattern, of sorts, he has a bad day or a shift or world war seven hundred and forty six breaks out at home, and he’ll just send Harry a text. Just a so were you unfortunate enough to walk in on niall and justin in the locker room today, or just me? or you’ve sucked me into this stupid show, you know. And maybe Harry knows he likes to talk to him if he’s upset and tired, maybe he doesn’t, but either way it’s nice. It’s nice without making Louis feel guilty – this, if nothing else, can be construed purely as friendship, he’s not dragging him into anything he won’t see coming – so he lets himself enjoy this one.

For a while, that is. Because somewhere a long the way, he and Harry stumble over that line of workmates who text occasionally to, well, friends, and once that line is crossed others get blurred. It’s why Zayn can text him at half nine on a Thursday – Gosling, Alex Turner, Johnny Depp, that guy in the theatre society and young Mick Jagger. that’s my list and he will reply what the fuck are you talking about and Zayn will say the list of guys I would suck off without hesitation and it’s definitively not weird. It’s why he can innocuously text Niall hey mate, how was your weekend and Niall can reply hm well if u really wanna know turns out canadians shag better than everyone in this whole city your missing out lou ;), and he can still acquaint with him.

But with Harry, of course, it is different, and Louis is finding that this applies to a lot of things that concern Harry. Because he has no desire to get into Niall’s pants and while three years ago he might have felt a little differently about Zayn, it’s most definitely subsided. But when Harry sends him flirty messages, or waves at him from across the pool, or stays back to help him close everything up at the end of the day, Louis can’t help but feel it’s different. That the way it makes him want to disintegrate into a pile of dust and broken will perhaps isn’t the way he wants to be feeling about another person at this point in time, that it’s maybe more than, oh, he’s quite nice to look at, let’s keep him shirtless at all times.

And at any other point in his life, that would be welcome. Louis, for what it’s worth, likes being in a relationship. He likes having a dependable, because there’s never been too many of them in his life and having someone around is just nice, even if it has the tendency to head south after a while. But, fuck, right now just isn’t a good time for twelve feet of good guy crammed into a six-foot-something body to come wandering into his life. He didn’t come home to pine after some boy and he’s not going to fall into that. He’s just not.

“Lou!”

Louis turns from the big glass doors with a smile, Harry hitching his bag up over his shoulder as he catches up. They’ve just clocked off, Harry’s hair is damp and he’s got what looks to be the world’s most comfortable jumper hanging loosely off his shoulders.

“Hey,” he says as he falls into step with Louis, the two of them walking out together, “you have an alright day?”

“Oh, yeah,” Louis says dryly, still slightly bitter about being relegated to the kid’s pool for the day, “saving lives, changing hearts, all of that.”

Harry laughs, and Louis thinks he’s going to turn to the carpark while Louis continues up to the bus stop, but he stops instead, grabs Louis’ arm gently.

“Hey, so I was thinking,” he says, and he seems nervous, brow furrowed slightly and biting his lip, which is so sweet that Louis’ sure he would just melt into syrup in the rain, “do you want to, like, grab a drink? Or something? If, y’know, you’re not busy?”

And God, is it even a question, because of course he fucking wants to. Sometimes he wonders if Harry knows the allure he has, he thinks he mustn’t, because if he were Harry he wouldn’t so much ask for a date as charge people good money to be seen with him. Louis wants to sent a plane in the sky to write Yes, you idiot, I want to get a drink with you possibly more than I want to achieve the UN Millennium Goals, I want to get a drink with you more than literally any other thing on the planet, feasible or not, but he supposes that’s too wordy. But. He does want to say yes. It’s Thursday, his mother’s home early so he doesn’t need to go and make sure the girls are okay. Theoretically, yes, his answer can be in the affirmative.

But – and there’s always a but and it’s fast becoming Louis’ least favourite word in the world – but then there’s the fact that his Mum’s been alone all day and could probably do with someone to help her out tonight. There’s the fact that he promised Charlotte he’d help her with history and there’s the fact that this is what he put his whole life on hold to do, to be there for his Mum and for his sisters and not to go on a pub crawl with the loveliest English major in Manchester.

Louis fucking hates facts but there they are and there’s nothing he can do about it.

So he smiles, runs a hand through his hair and tries not to replay Harry’s face as he’d asked him out on a loop for the rest of his life.

“I actually have to get home,” he says gently, “it’s…it’s kind of a long story. But. I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?”

Harry nods, locks eyes with him just for a second and he’s so fucking wonderful that Louis…well, nothing, really. He has no hyperbole in his head to adequately diffuse whatever this is. He’s great. Louis’ turned him down. That’s all there is to it, really.

“Yeah, course, Lou. See you,” he says, and with one last smile that may or may not reach his eyes, he turns and heads down to the car park.

**

“Everything’s shit,” Louis says matter-of-factly, phone cradled between his cheek and shoulder as he runs the iron over his Mum’s uniform for her shift that night, “I mean, like, everything.”

“It’s not,” Zayn says, “you’re being a dick. Go for a drink with him Louis, Jesus, why’s it like pulling teeth this time?”

He sighs, flicks the iron off at the wall.

“Because it’s just…her fucking face, Zayn,” he says quietly, “it’s like. I walk in after seeing you lot for a few hours and she just looks so miserable. What am I meant to do, walk in and tell her all about my lovely date with a lovely boy so she can feel just that little bit more shithouse about everything?”

Zayn’s quiet on the other end of the line.

“She’s my mum,” he says, “I dunno, man, I can’t do that to her.”

“Lou,” he says, “she’s your mother. Firstly, she’s like, a grown woman, she can look after herself. Secondly, mate. Have you even met her?”

“What’s that—“

“I have never met someone so intent on her children being happy than your Mum, Lou. She’d be fucking over the moon for you.”

Louis bites his lip.

“Can we talk about something else?” he says, a little too loud and exasperated, and Louis’ willing to bed the oh-so-vast reserves of cash in his bank account that Zayn’s eye roll right there was one for the ages.

“Sure,” he says, deadpan, “how’s the weather where you are?”

**

The twins get sick.

The twins get sick from their cesspool of a school, and Louis’ Mum can’t miss work because she has, like, a brood to support, so Louis’ drafted on to stay home.

Which is fine, he supposes, because his job is shit and maybe it’s not an entirely bad thing to take a few days away from Harry. This is fine. This is all going to work out.

By day three, however, when he wakes up to a headache and a throat with the texture of a nail file, not to mention two little girls snuggled into his side making it feel like he’s got three fevers instead of one, he thinks he might’ve been wrong.

call the mortuary, he texts niall, thankfully able to reach his phone, for i have perished.

mate u want soup or like butter menthols is the almost immediate reply, and while Louis’ a little bitter about Niall’s indifference to his melodramatics, he also does very much want soup and butter menthols, so texts back a reply in the affirmative and goes back to sleep.

The next thing he hears, some hours later, is someone whispering right in his ear.

“Lou,” the little voice says, and for a moment his delirium filled brain is sure that it’s Ice T wearing a tank top in Leeds, but cracking one eye open proves that it is, in fact, Daisy.

“Hey, babe,” he says croakily, sitting up and trying to will the pounding in his head away. Everything is sore, and not in a good way, “you alright?”

She shrugs, grabs his hand and tugs him up.

“M’okay. There’s someone at the door, though.”

“Oh.” He sways on the spot a little trying to stop the walls swimming in front of his eyes. He wonders, vaguely, is this is what comes from working too long with water. Probably it’s the fever, though. He’ll let this one slide.

“C’mon, then, let’s go,” he murmurs, pulling her into his side and playing with her hair. She giggles, and Louis remembers to make his sisters tired and sleepy more of the time because they’re quite fucking delightful when they’re not yelling the place down. With a groan – because he really does feel like death’s dropped him a line and is currently having a pint with his soul – he bends down and picks her up, carries her downstairs with him.

“S”just Niall, babe, he’ll make us some food and then we can watch a movie. What d’you wanna watch, hm?”

She nuzzles into his shoulder sleepily.

“Mean Girls,” she says decisively, and his eyes just about fall out of his head.

“How’ve you watched Mean Girls?” he squawks at her, pitch making his own head hurt, “no, not that, you’re about four.”

“Not four,” she sighs, world-weary or perhaps just Louis-weary, “you’re dumb.”

“I,” he proclaims, tickling her with his free hand till she squirms, “am not dumb.”

“Okay!” she laughs, before groaning, “I’m sick, Lou, stop, I take it back.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, jamming the key in the door and unlocking it, “too sick to take a tickle but just well enough to insult your big broth—“

It’s a good thing Daisy’s clung round him like a squid, or he’s quite sure he would’ve dropped her promptly and without hesitation. Because it is not Niall brandishing three bowls of piping hot soup and a pharmacy’s supply of over the counter medication and jellybeans, no. It is, of course, because the universe is conspiring against him one unexpected meeting at a time, Harry Styles.

“Hey,” he says with a smile, “how’re you feeling?”

Louis is feeling like burying Niall alive in the middle of the Gobi desert, but he’s not sure that’s what Harry’s referring to.

“Fine!” he says overenthusiastically, voice cracking and horribly betraying him, like apparently everything else on this earth including his best friends, “well. You know. Okay.”

“He’s lying,” a voice says behind him, and, well, there goes his last bastion of solidarity, his family too, Phoebe looking between Louis and Harry with a smirk, “he’s really sick, actually, we all are.”

“Well I’m sorry to hear that,” Harry says, the image of concern, “you starting to feel a bit better, though?”

She nods, smiles like a little goddamned angel up at him.

“Yeah,” she chirps, “’M’Phoebe.”

“Hey, nice to meet you!” he says, “I’m Harry, I work with Louis at the pool.”

“We know,” she smirks, “Zayn’s told us that you and Lou—“

“You should come in!” Louis says, and no, he wants to yell immediately you most definitely shouldn’t because I look half dead and you look fucking wonderful and it’s not fair, “I mean, you know, if you want to.”

“Sure, mate,” he says, stepping inside and following Louis through the kitchen, “Niall had to go see his Mum, apparently, so he sent me instead.”

Louis just rolls his eyes. “Unless he was getting on a plane back to Ireland, you, my friend, just got spectacularly duped.”

Harry looks blank.

“His mother lives back in his hometown,” Louis laughs, and Harry scrunches his face up in just about the cutest way Louis’ ever seen, “oh my God. He’s never gonna let you forget this, Harry.”

“Well damn it,” Harry laughs, unpacking takeaway cartons of soup and fishing round in Louis’ drawers for spoons like he’s been here a thousand times before. Louis tries not to stare too much, he’s sure he’s failing miserably, “so I’m guessing he made other plans?”

“With Justin, probably,” Louis says, rolling his eyes, “they’re like lice to hair, those two. Probably have a little guitar date or something else equally as disgusting.”

“Having a strum,” Harry grins at him as he passes him a bowl, and instead of choking on this boy’s very existence, he shoots him a reproachful glare instead.

“There are children in this house, Harry,” he says haughtily, picking up the other two bowls for the girls and walking into the living room, Harry behind him, “I won’t have you corrupting them.”

Harry ducks his head, laughs a little as they sit down in front of the TV, and the girls eye them suspiciously.

“What’s so funny?” Daisy asks, and Louis shakes his head, sits down on the couch with a yawn.

“Nothing, babe. Eat your soup. Now, what are we watching?”

An hour into The Lizzie McGuire Movie, Louis comes to with a start, blinking blearily to see the twins out cold, heady mix of flu, sweets and chicken noodle too much for them. Then he turns to see Harry, eyes wide and attentive as Lizzie and Paolo meet at the Trevi Fountain – Louis has seen this film once or twice – chewing on the last of the jellybeans slowly. He looks like someone Louis would very much like to nuzzle up to and bitch about his illness with, and he briefly considers going back to sleep for the rest of his life just to avoid thinking that again.

“Hi,” Harry says quietly, smiling as he looks over at Louis, “sorry I’m still here, by the way, just you crashed out and I didn’t want to leave without saying bye.”

Louis ignores that because it’s too much when his body’s already this much over it’s normal temperature.

“Enjoying the film, were we?” he asks with a smile, before laughing, “I’ll be back in a sec, I’ll just take the girls upstairs.”

“You want a hand?” he asks, standing up, “no offence Lou, I think you’re gonna struggle carrying two of them at once.”

It’s Louis’ kneejerk reaction to say I’m fine, I can manage, but he bites it back.

“Sure,” he says, “thanks. Be careful, though, I don’t wanna wake…” he cuts himself off with a laugh, realises he’s nagging like an idiot, but Harry’s just giving him this funny smile and it makes Louis feel warmer than whichever pathogen has decided to set up camp in his immune system.

They carry the girls upstairs and put them to bed quietly, and Harry’s just about the gentlest person ever, sets Phoebe down slowly and brushes the hair off her face before tucking her in.

Louis nods at him to follow him out, and they collapse downstairs again, Louis in self-imposed isolation on the couch and Harry in one of the big armchairs.

“You’re so sweet with them,” Harry muses quietly, “they’re lucky to have you, Lou.”

Louis looks down at the floor and tries not to blush furiously. He’s not sure it works.

“Sorry,” he continues, “that was weird. I just, I dunno, my sister was like my favourite person in the world when I was growing up, it just reminded me of her, seeing you guys together.”

“Oh yeah?” Louis asks, “what’s her name?”

Harry starts in telling him about his family, his sister in London and his Mum in Cheshire, Dad too. He doesn’t pry, just listens, Harry’s voice strangely slow and soothing in the face of the thumping of his brain.

“Sounds nice,” he says with a smile, when Harry tells him about his stepdad’s bungalow in the country, “bit posh with your holiday house, Haz.”

Harry laughs, shakes his head.

“Nah, not really,” he says, “how about you, though? They your only siblings?”

Louis laughs in spite of himself. “No,” he says, “no, two others who haven’t succumbed to the black plague. Four girls and my Mum.”

“Outnumbered,” Harry notes with a smile, “that’s really nice. You moved back here this year right, Liam was telling me.”

“Yeah,” he says, “no, I was at school in town, college, y’know, but. Last year was…” he searches for the words, not sure if he wants to go into it, “shitty, you know. Family wise. So I moved back for a bit to help out.”

“Fuck,” Harry says, “that’s amazing.”

Louis smiles in spite of himself, risks tearing himself away from his intensive thread pulling to lock eyes with Harry, just for a second. He is entirely – and somewhat surprisingly – genuine.

“Nah,” he says, “just cook pasta a couple of nights a week and chauffeur ‘em all around. But hey. Thanks, you know.”

Harry smiles again, seems to take that as his queue.

“I have to finish a paper,” he says, “or I’m gonna flunk out and then Liam’s hours of intensive stats tutoring are going to have been for nothing. But I hope you feel better soon, Lou, give me a call if you need anything.”

Louis stands to show him out but Harry stops him.

“S’okay, I got it. Don’t want you to get all dizzy or whatever,” he says, “see you soon, yeah?”

Louis sits up, smiles at him as he backs out, smile bright and small.

“Yeah, definitely,” he says, “keep guard of the pool for me.”

Harry’s laugh rings through the house as he opens the door and shuts it gently behind him, and Louis resolves to just go to sleep and ascertain if today was a hallucination or not at a later date.

**

As it turns out when he emerges on the other side of his influenza hell three days later, it was not a dream.

So, there is that.

There is also the fact that despite feeling only slightly less like shit than he has all week, he’s probably closer to getting fired than he’d like to be, so he pulls his very tired and very achey body out of bed on Monday morning and for the first time in a week doesn’t call in sick.  He takes a long hot shower and has a good breakfast, and by the time he makes it to the bus is feeling relatively human.

Apparently, Zayn has a sixth sense – well, seventh, his sixth is cute Hemmingway enthusiasts more than willing to listen to him talk deep and seriously about literature for hours – for knowing when he’s back on the radar, because his phone rings not two minutes into his trip.

“’Llo?” he says with a yawn, and it’s to a lazy cheer from Zayn’s end.

“He lives! You recovered from the Spanish flu yet?”

Louis laughs raspily, leans up against the window.

“More or less,” he says, “I’m so tired, mate.”

“Aww, Lou,” Zayn says, but uncharacteristically there is no taunt to follow, no sardonic quip about his lack of a sex life or the fact he’s turning into a forty-something about twenty years too early.

“What’s going on?” Louis asks warily, “why’re you all quiet?”

He distinctly hears a snigger, a clatter and a shh somewhere in Zayn’s vicinity; he doesn’t like it at all.

“I’m not quiet,” Zayn says, smirk louder than his voice, “just calling to see how your week was, you know.”

“Ask him about Harr—“

“Shhh.”

And well, unless Louis is gravely mistaken, Zayn and Liam are crowded around the phone like retirees calling their kids in the big smoke, and Louis isn’t sure if he’s offended, amused, or embarrassed on their behalf.

“Oh my God,” Louis says, laugh of disbelief escaping him, “oh my God, Zayn. It was you, wasn’t it?”

The very guilty silence on the other line is somewhat of a confirmation. Louis all but raises a hand to hit him before he remembers he’s not actually here.

“You fucking made Niall send Harry over, I knew that was unlike him,” he says, before groaning, “you’re the worst friend in the world.”

“No I’m not,” Zayn snaps, “I’m a bloody wonderful friend, you’re welcome by the way. And Niall actually did have a date to give the Canadian a blowjob, or something, I didn’t ask questions.”

Louis drops his head onto the bar of the seat in front of him. This week is already too much for him. He thinks he might go back to bed.

“So,” Zayn prompts, “what happened?”

“Who are you, Agatha fucking Christie?”

“Don’t deflect, you arsehole.”

And who is Louis, really, to resist charm like that?

“He was lovely,” he mutters, “we watched The Lizzie McGuire Movie, I sweated my fever out like a fucking racehorse, and then he left. Thrilling stuff, I know. You might as well call the Mirror right now.”

“Louis.”

“What!” he cries, much to the disdain of the man sitting across from him. Probably, Louis thinks, the general public isn’t mad on hearing about his love life, or distinct lack thereof. “I don’t know what you want me to say,” he says, voice lower, “it’s like dangling a fucking carrot in front of…well I don’t know. Whichever animal that metaphor’s based on,” he finishes haughtily, “so forgive me for not bowing down to your master plan.”

Zayn just snorts, which only serves to piss him off further.

“Don’t laugh at me,” he pouts – he does, in fact, actually pout, and realises vaguely that he should brush up on the limitations of telecommunication  - “why’re you laughing?”

“Well, firstly, that’s a simile, not a metaphor,” Zayn says matter-of-factly, and before Louis can get in there with a declaration of you pretentious twat, I’m hanging up on you, he keeps going, “and secondly, it’s a stupid one at that because you can just reach the fuck out and take the goddamned carrot, Louis.”

Louis blinks.

“Is that a euphemism?” he asks with a grin.

“Quite possibly, yes,” Zayn says, taking what sounds like a gulp of tea, “but that’s not the point, and you know it. There’s no self sacrificing pining necessary, Louis, just say yes when he asks you for a drink next time.”

“I can’t,” he says flatly, “so. No.”

“Why not?”

Louis tears the phone from his ear as Zayn lets out an exasperated sigh.

“Because,” he says, and apparently he is now one of those people who hash out the intricacies of their horribly mundane lives on public transport, “because, fuck, Zayn, I can either be really good at helping my Mum out or I can be a really good, y’know, whatever.”

“The word you’re looking for,” Zayn says smugly, “is boyfriend.”

“Whatever. I can be good at one or I can be shitty at both. And I’m not doing that, to either of them, because it’s not fair.”

There’s a silence at that, and Louis suddenly feels distinctly uncomfortable on this bus. Hello, suburban Manchester, he wants to say, please, don’t hate me. I’m not usually this person. If you’d seen this boy you’d understand. Quite possibly I’ve also cast a protective eye over one of your family members or friends at the leisure centre too, so please, ease off with the judgmental stares.

It is perhaps a good thing he doesn’t get the opportunity to plead his case, he’s not sure it would lead to love and adoration from his fellow TfGM patrons.

“I think,” Zayn says slowly, “you don’t give yourself enough credit. Or him, actually. He’s pretty relaxed, Lou, I don’t think he’d spit his fucking dummy if you were busy a few days a week, y’know, I—“

“Zayn.”

They both know, in that moment, that the conversation is over. Louis is met with a sigh of resignation and a crunch of toast.

“Fine,” Zayn says, “fine. What’re you doing tonight, anyway?”

Louis groans a little, just because he can, because he’s having a good old-fashioned wallow right now and he intends to do it properly.

“Nothing. Mum’s home, so don’t have to do the girls. Might just drown in my own misery, to be honest.”

“Sounds like a blast, mate.”

Louis nods, smiles as the bus pulls up at his stop.

“Oh yeah. S’gonna be great. Hey, I gotta go, but talk to you tonight or something?”

“Sure,” Zayn says, and Louis goes to hang up, but then, “Lou?”

“Yeah?”

“Love you, okay.”

Louis smiles, stands and hitches his bag up.

“Love you more.”

Louis leaves the bus with not much more than a pinch of dignity and a really fucking good best friend left to his name. He thinks, in spite of it all, he can work with that.

**

Over the past month or two or decade, Louis doesn’t know, things become somewhat warped when one is working in Harry time; Louis’ grown quite proud of his ability to deal with seeing Harry half naked from nine till five (more or less) every other day. Apparently, along with his white blood cells and will to live, the virus that made a nice little home in his body last week savagely attacked that particular skill too, because by God Louis just about falls off his elevated chair as he glances across the pool and sees him sitting there.

Harry acts very bloody strange all day. Louis supposes that doesn’t mean a lot coming from someone who genuinely has to spend his entire time on the clock choosing when exactly would be best to chance a look at his offensively attractive co-worker, but his point still stands. He’s just a little more overt from the get go; whistles over the noise to get Louis’ attention every so often, texts him throughout the day, stupid little things like the red brings out your eyes (are you calling me demonic?, he replies, and he quite distinctly hears him laugh not ten seconds later). Louis’ll look up and catch him staring and they’ll do this ridiculous, childish thing of locking eyes until one of them – most often Harry – breaks and laughs. By lunch, Louis imagines this is how Jesus felt atop the mountain with the Devil, only it’sworse because as arduous as fasting in the Judean Desert for forty days would no doubt be, at least Jesus didn’t have to look at Harry Styles half naked all day.

Louis needs to focus on his job, or at the very least, stop comparing himself to the Messiah quite so frequently.

By five o’clock, primary school kids done with their swimming classes and every other slightly odd member of the community shepherded out, Louis is heading into the locker room to get changed. He’s so fucking tired that even when he hears a suspiciously breathy moan coming from one of the stalls, he can’t find the energy within himself to do more than wrinkle his nose up and grab his bag that bit faster. No one even bats an eyelid at Justin and Niall anymore; as long as the cubicle door’s shut the rest of them uses sheer fucking mindforce to block out their frankly superfluous noises and get out of there as soon as possible.

He tugs his jumper and jeans on and goes to leave.

“Oi!” he says, can’t quite resist hammering on the door. He can almost hear them freeze up, and it makes him smirk, “once you’ve finished getting off, lock up the back, yeah?”

There’s a pause, a rustle of clothes and movement.

“Yeah, Lou,” Niall forces out, trying to control his breathing, “got it.”

And really, Louis could go the rest of his life without hearing Niall say his name like that again, so he hammers on the door once more and turns to go.

“Be safe, boys!” he calls obnoxiously, and with that makes a timely exit.

He sighs as he walks up to the bus stop, headache and cool air catching up with him as he reaches the top of the hill. With a groan, he sits down, and almost – almost – misses the three post-it notes stuck to the glass pane next to him.

Louis

Shit I wrote on that one too big now I need another one

D’you wanna get a drink tonight?

Fleetingly feeling like he’s stumbled into a Christopher Nolan film, Louis blinks once, and then twice.

Possibly it’s the Advil coursing through his veins, or the fact that he’s being propositioned by three pieces of yellow paper at a bus stop, but it’s not until he hears a little laugh from over the road that he pieces it together.

And, well, call the heart surgeon and the psychiatrist, he thinks, the time has come, that laugh has hit him just right. Harry jogs over the road, wind messing his hair up a little, and he stops in front of Louis.

“Sorry,” he says, smile a little flustered but not embarrassed, “that was probably weird, now I think about it. But seriously, you want to get a drink?”

“I,” Louis says intelligibly, because yes, you’re completely fucking weird and no, that doesn’t turn me off in the slightest, and how do you do that, he wants to ask,really, how do you, because if you’re performing black magic on me I’ll be kind of disappointed.

“I,” he starts again, and God, he feels like a guttersnipe, lying to this gorgeous person after this, but he can’t think of what else to do, “I’ve got to get home, y’know. I’m busy tonight, I’m sorry.”

Harry, surprisingly, just grins like he’s got a goddamned secret.

“Really?” he asks, smiling at Louis and swaying nonchalantly on the spot, “because I was under the impression that you were just going home to drown in your own misery. I mean, at the very least, come and get a beer before you meet your untimely end.”

Louis closes his eyes, laughs a little wearily at the ground for a moment.

“Has Zayn got me wire tapped now, or something?” he asks, “look, Harry, I’m sorry they keep bugging you, it’s—“

“Zayn,” Harry says, like he’s just solved a Rubik’s Cube, “my money was on Liam. Damn it.”

Now Louis is properly confused, and Harry just laughs.

“I got the bus this morning,” he says carefully, “sat up the back like a proper delinquent and everything. Couldn’t help notice someone a few seats in front having a good old overshare in front of the general public.”

If one listened closely, Louis thinks, one may just be able to hear his internal organs say, well, looks like we’re about done here, and switch themselves off in unison.

This is, without a singular doubt, the most mortifying experience of his life.

“Oh my God,” he says blankly, and then, purely because he thinks three quarters of his vocabulary have also pulled up stumps, “oh my God.”

Harry smiles, lifts his gaze and looks out to the street for a moment.

“I’m sorry, for eavesdropping and whatever,” he says, he’s so sweet, “but to be fair, you don’t exactly have the quietest voice in the world.”

“No,” Louis agrees faintly, “no, I guess I don’t.”

“But, you know, all that…stuff you were saying, right? Is that the reason you turned me down the other day? Because, like. This is really fucking lame, bear with me, but I called Liam that night? And, like, he said that you weren’t busy, or whatever, that he’d spoken to you earlier?”

Louis doesn’t know what to say, so opens and closes his mouth and furrows his brow. Perhaps if makes enough facial expressions, he can fool Harry into thinking he’s saying words.

“You don’t have to, like, say anything, or whatever,” Harry says, and all of a sudden he looks nervous and small, “sorry. Like, if you’re not interested, or whatever, I totally get that, and I’ll stop asking because there’s a point where that becomes creepy and very fucking odd, I know. I just…” he trails off, bites his lip, “wanted to be sure?”

And, right, Louis needs to speak at some point because if he lets Harry Styles wander off into the night thinking Louis is anything less than head fucking over for him, he’ll never forgive himself.

“No,” he says quickly, and again, his masterful use of the English language leaves him astounded, “no, it’s like. Oh, God, please don’t think it’s anything personal, because it’s not.”

“Okay,” he says dubiously. Louis reconsiders flinging himself off the ten-metre diving board again.

“No, but, I mean it. Like, it’s just. Complicated, you know.”

Harry shrugs, quirks a smile again. “I like complicated,” he says, “we should get a drink.”

“What?”

“Just do it,” Harry says, like it’s the easiest thing in the world, “complicated’s okay, I promise.”

“Harry,” Louis says a little desperately, and while before his oratory skills were wildly underwhelming, at this point he’s impressed that he can speak two syllable words, “I can’t. It’s just, it won’t end well.”

Harry, quite unexpectedly, just leans back against the bus shelter, cocks his head a little.

“Why?”

And where to begin, Louis thinks, but he needs to choose somewhere because he’s not letting Harry walk off without getting it.

“Because,” he says slowly, “this isn’t going to be what you want, you know, and it’ll be my fault. It’s going to be weird for you and uncomfortable and unpredictable and me losing my shit, or falling off the radar, or standing you up or leaving early because I need to go home and deal with some fucking minor crisis or another, you know. Like. I’m not that much fun anymore, or something. I’m tired a lot and I’m annoyed a lot and you just. You don’t want to have to deal with all the bullshit that comes attached to me right now.”

Louis, when he can find the willpower to lift his gaze and look at Harry after that little outburst, is met with quite possibly the most heart-stopping smile on the planet.

“You,” he says simply, “have thought about this.”

Louis can’t help but laugh, because fuck it, cat’s out of the bag, he supposes.

“Yeah,” he says weakly, “a bit, you know. Here and there.”

“You’re wrong, though,” Harry says, “I do, actually.”

“You do what?”

“Want to deal with all the bullshit that comes attached.” He makes little quotation marks in the air; he has nice hands, Louis thinks absently, and he’s in too deep to really mind how weird that thought is.

“Harry, I’m…messy, right now,” he says, “I’m stuck—“

Harry, it seems, will never know where Louis is stuck, because before he can finish, he leans forward, fingers closing gently round Louis’ wrist, and kisses him quiet.

By some miracle of God, Louis’ heart continues beating.

Harry has a lovely mouth, this much Louis has known for quite some time now, but by God does he know how to put it to use, too. He rests his left hand on Louis’ waist and pulls him closer, lips warm and soft against Louis’, almost smiling as he teases at his bottom lip. His skin is soft, Louis notices as he brushes a hand over his cheek, and heaven help him he’s going to need another Advil or two after this.

Harry pulls away slowly, flushed and smiling as Louis floats back on down to Earth.

“I don’t care,” he says, leaning in and pressing another kiss to Louis’ lips quickly, “Christ, do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted to do that for?”

Yes, Louis thinks, he has a fair approximation.

“Louis?” Harry says, more of a question than anything else, “I mean. Hate to sound like a broken record. But do you want to get a—“

“Yes,” Louis says, not waiting for him to finish, because what’s the point, really. He’s wonderful, Louis’ fucked, and holding out for two more seconds isn’t really going to change the fact that there was only ever going to be one answer leaving his lips tonight, “yes, let’s get a drink.”

Harry smiles, rests his head back against the shelter and laughs. Louis’ heart jumps a little. It’s okay, he reminds himself, it’s just a drink, it’ll be okay, it’s a drink, nothing more.

Except, of course, it just might be, because Harry’s hand is still circled round his wrist, and he’s already growing rather attached to that.