All This, And Love Too. (1)
All This, And Love Too.Fandom: One Direction
Pairing: Harry/Louis
Summary: Harry is desperately in love with Louis which is hard enough to ignore on any normal day but then, Louis starts to have horrible nightmares that make him sneak into Harry's bed at night. Partly based on Come Out of The Shade by The Perishers (partly because Zoya asked for a fic about it and this is what happened.)
For Zoya and I'm sorry for not totally sticking to the song. For Liss because she fixed all my mistakes. For Jessus because she's dumb. For Reema, and Lauren because love reasons tbh.
DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. I do not own Harry, Louis or any member of One Direction. If I did I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be writing fic about them tbh.
“The unconscious wants truth. It ceases to speak to those who want something else more than truth.”
The pulse of love begins beating long before you can hear it. It crawls up drainpipe veins like a spider making its way to a web that’s tucked carefully beneath your ribcage. Things that are shaded are soft and silent, without a name until a voice speaks to you and baptises everything. Then and only then will you know that you’ve been waiting to be tangled.
When flashbulbs are burning your eyes there's never enough time to keep them open long enough to see what surrounds you. It’s a constant blur of here, there and nowhere in between. Every airport feels like every airport and every hotel room is another room that's not home. But there are moments reserved in the midst of lightning storms for stillness- a hand on his back, holding him up, reminding him that home is not something that you leave behind but what you take with you.
The thing is, Harry’s in love with his best friend. He’s in love with the way his eyes crinkles when he laughs, he’s in love with his morning voice, the way he drinks his tea, how he knows exactly how to comfort Harry and when. Harry used to think that maybe, just maybe Louis might have felt the same way until he realised that this was just how Louis was. It meant nothing.
♔
If fear is the foundation block for any dream then Louis could construct a mountain.
The nightmares begin at the second leg of their US tour. It wouldn't have been obvious to anyone but Harry notices most things, especially when those things are related to Louis. First it was the shuffling footsteps at night, the pacing outside the door and the soft buzz of a TV in the background at 5am. The first few times he asked Louis brushed it off with excuses about time-zones and it wasn't anything big, really, he just couldn't sleep.
Then, Harry started to see him shaking and chugging down more Red Bull than a normal human being should consume in any given day. When alcohol screws with your senses it cuts off all the little nerves in your fingers and toes, it messes with every transmitter that links to your brain, and Harry remembered learning about these things in school, about how nerves lose their shields, drop their shells and become defenceless and that's why an alcoholics' arm will shake because they've lost control. Nightmares are like that, Louis was glued awake and unable to escape to anything other than a place that tortures him.
“It’s quite stupid, they’re only bad dreams. Stop worrying so much.” Louis says, as if he really falls asleep peacefully at night, as if it's really that easy, that simple, that silent of a matter.
Louis will do that, he'll brush things off with a smile and Harry thinks it's unfair. It's unfair that Louis has the ability to place a hand on his back and make him feel at home, to make him feel safe and that Harry can't do the same for him.
Harry wakes in the morning to find Louis puffy eyed and glued to the TV screen, a Wii controller held firmly between his hands.
“Rabbits, this time - infected with a blood curdling virus. They chased me.” Louis hasn’t slept and his voice is still cheery. Harry ponders how that is even possible because he knows that Lou hasn’t slept properly in at least a week.
“Come on. I’ll make the tea.” Harry nods towards Louis, motioning him to the kitchen.
And that was it most mornings. Louis gives a very brief rundown of his nightmare, Harry makes tea and breakfast, never asking anything more because he knows Louis will speak about it if he needs to. There are some things you don’t question.
♔
The first time it happens is the first night that Harry hears him scream. Before he had a chance to pull his body from bed to see if everything was okay there was a silhouette in his doorframe. Long, slim, black shadows that Harry knew inside out even in the darkness. Neither of them said a word, they didn’t have to. There is a time and place for questions and they don’t belong in the space between the sheets of your bed. They don’t belong between you and the inch of your mattress that’s separating your body from your best friend.
“Tell me a story, Harry.”
So Harry tells him the greatest story that he could think of, about a boy who slept without dreaming and that’s just what Louis does.
There are some things you're not supposed to dwell on. Harry knows this, knows that every time Louis touches him that it's not a secret two hundred year old message that he should try to decode. He knows that when Louis says that Harry is his best mate that he shouldn't feel his ribcage tighten like it's trying to choke his heart. He knows this. He knows these things- knows that things don't get easier before they get worse and he knows that he shouldn't trick himself into believing that Louis sneaking beneath his sheets at night is anything more than a coping method. But, Harry also knows that some people grow out instead of up. Some people are oak trees with broken branches and falling leaves, sometimes spring arrives every day. Harry knows that he's been living his life sideways.
There are thousands of different types of nightmares with a million unlocked meanings. Harry’s researched it. He’s slipped into quiet bookstores before signings and shows to pick up books, he’s spent hours on Google typing different combinations of words hoping that they’d bring up different results, hoping that he’d find an answer for Louis. Not that he’d be able to because Louis never told him anything about the nightmares. Never said anything more than a few words before quickly changing the subject and there weren’t many books about how to stop nightmares or dreams.
“Alright, Harold,” Louis is lying back on a couch in the tour bus, his body strewn across it like an old ragdoll, “give me your best psychoanalysis.”
Harry narrows his eyes and shuffled through the pages of the book in his hands. ‘The Mysterious World of Nightmares’ it had been lying at the bottom of a clearance shelf and Harry is almost certain that the author was probably some kind of new-age hippie but, if it could help Louis then he’d give anything a chance. “Seriously, Lou, I’m trying to fix this.”
“Sorry, Freud! Poke my brain then, try to be gentle though, Harry. Can’t you see how fragile I am?”
“You look like a right twat,” Harry scoffs at him, throwing the book onto the table.
“I feel like one. We’ll keep the poking for tonight, yeah?”
And, it wasn’t funny but Harry laughs anyway because it’s Louis’ joke.
♔
It’s been four days. Louis has crept into Harry’s bed every night. They still haven’t found a cure. Tonight it feels different. Harry can feel it the second Louis walks stumbles through the door, tiptoeing his way to the bed. Tonight’s different and Harry’s not sure why.
He leans towards Louis like his bones are bent over with a heavy wind. He thinks, if you could find meaning in closeness, he would stay this way forever. He would sink into the waft of shower lemon scented gel and tea that passes through the air every time that Louis inches closer to him.
“Where to tonight?” and just as he asks that, he shivers because Louis’ hand has just made a bed around his own.
“To the moon, Harry.”
He needs a moment to adjust to the sudden shivers - the goose bumps that appear on his skin whenever Louis touches him and he feels his body wilt, as if it’s embarrassed by how fully he loves Louis.
This is the place where faith slips into a coma. This is the place that will twist thoughts until it's impossible to recognise them. Their limbs are tangled, knotted together. Harry can’t sleep and he knows that Louis isn’t sleeping either. Their hands are still gripped tightly together, both of them pretending to be in any other place than this. Maybe he should have looked for books about how to stop loving instead of how to stop nightmares. Maybe he should have shielded himself from Louis since the start. Maybe he should have let go of his hand. Maybe, maybe, maybe and nothing could convince him that he should have, not really.
Harry wakes to his name in whispers and then shouts.
“Styles, if you don’t get out of bed right this very moment, I’ll be forced to throw this egg over your head.”
Louis is kneeling on the bed holding a plate close to Harry’s nose. “That is the scent of a day off. Smells good doesn’t it?”
“You made me breakfast? When did we switch roles?” Harry croaks, lifting his head from the pillow and taking the plate from Louis’s hands.
“Husbands don’t need a reason to treat their wives to breakfast.”
“You’re not my husband, Lou- did you get any sleep?”
“Wife then, and a bit. This time I was Jack, the giant wanted to eat me and I couldn’t find the beanstalk.” He smiles, pushing the fork to Harry’s mouth before he has a chance to ask any more questions. Louis was a lot of things but he definitely wasn’t a good liar.
The other boys had already made plans without them. Liam was spending the day with Danielle, Zayn and Niall are spending the day battling it out on Mario Kart, and Harry, who had apparently slept through the memo, was getting a full rundown of the itinerary that Louis had planned for him.
Harry finds himself staring at the boy in front of him, the boy that faintly looks like his best friend, the boy who can never be more than his best friend. He's red eyed, and smiling and the old Louis is barely visible, an outline, a phrase and a wisp of a smile.
"We'll walk around all day, it'll exhaust me and then I'll have to fall asleep." Louis shifts off the bed, he’s smiling, his hands aren’t shaking as much and it's an improvement, Harry thinks.
♔
If this were a scene in a romantic comedy, Harry thinks that he'd make his move now. So maybe he's had a little too much cheap cider and the heat in the park is causing him to have delusional thoughts about whether he'd be Tom Hanks or Meg Ryan. He's pretty sure Louis would be Meg Ryan. Louis would laugh and turn around and Harry would catch him by surprise and kiss him right there. Louis would break away for a moment and maybe say something like “Harry, what are you doing?” before he’d lean back into the kiss and the credits would roll. Harry really wants to kiss him now but he doesn’t, he can’t.
Louis is picking tufts of grass and throwing them into Harry's curls. And maybe, if this was the kind of movie that Harry could really appreciate, Louis would stop that and drag him behind the nearest bushes and - maybe Harry should stop drinking.
The problem is, everything that Louis does is sort of adorable, even when he has bags under his eyes that he could carry his shopping home in, even when he's a little drunk and hasn't slept for days. All he has to do is smile and do something that should be annoying like, throwing grass at Harry and it makes Harry's stomach flutter.
“You’re staring again, Harry!” Louis chucks another handful of grass at his head.
Harry doesn’t know why Louis bothers pointing these things out now. He’s been staring at Louis since he met him. It’s like his eyes automatically settle on Louis whenever they’re near each other. It doesn’t matter who or what else is around, Harry will always, always choose to look at Louis.
“Am I?” Harry’s smile gravitates towards Louis, and his mouth is spewing things that he can’t stop because cider has evil qualities, “You’re fit.”
Harry is suddenly very aware that he’s drunk and that he’s not in the park anymore. He’s in his bed or at least he thinks it’s his bed. Louis is beside him. Harry can see every indentation, every line, every wrinkle of the blanket that’s covering Louis’ body. There’s far too much space between them, Harry thinks and oh god, it’s all coming back. Did he really tell Louis that he was fit?
Harry can see the outline of the blanket curling over Louis' exposed flesh. He's sleeping without a shirt on, of course, great, just bloody brilliant.
"Lou, you awake?" Harry's still, almost afraid to move any closer. Louis' bones are sharp, beautiful almost like they've been sculpted of their own free will because Harry is sure that no God could create anything this perfect. Louis grumbles and before Harry can respond with anything, there's static and those bones are on top of him, pressing down in all the right places and, fuck.
"You said I was fit then you passed out before I could say that you're a bit fit, too." Louis says, his voice is close, abstract and he's defying every wall that Harry has put between them.
Harry reaches out, his mouth is a bug, searching for a light source. He shivers as his lips press against Louis', they tangle together and he can feel Louis tugging on his hair. There is nothing else but this. He doesn't let his thoughts scatter away from what's happening. He's lost in this, lost in Louis.
He can feel everything, Louis' body moving slowly beneath him, their hips clashing together, Louis' tongue daring to slide against his. The hairs on Harry's skin lift and he allows himself to envelop his whole self into this, simply giving in and waiting.
part two