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The first time Louis thinks that he might just be in love with Harry Styles, they’ve barely know each other a month.
He is awoken, and he is aware that it is some obscene hour of the night because he can just tell, but he doesn’t know that it’s 3:19am until he looks at the digital clock flashing red numbers on his bedside table, and he doesn’t realise that his roommate is crying until he tries to figure out what exactly woke him.
Harry is crying.
He’s not sure whether to turn the light on, so he doesn’t. Neither is he sure whether to approach Harry, so he doesn’t. He watches him, for about three minutes, until Harry must see his blue eyes shining through the dark because he catches them with his own and appears to do everything he can to stop sobbing.
It’s not enough.
He wails, and he throws his duvet off the bed and onto the floor, and he pulls his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms tightly around his calves and whining “Louis!” in a way that breaks Louis’ heart in two.
He’s clearly in pain, severe physical pain, and Louis leaps out of his bed without a second thought and throws himself into Harry’s. The boy – two years his junior and still very much a teenager – curls into his warmth, and he seems to calm down, as if Louis is his own personal painkiller.
“What’s wrong, Haz?”
Louis whispers it, stubby fingers running through chestnut curls, an attempt to soothe even if it’s a feeble one.
“My…my legs!”
Louis looks down at his legs, which Harry has now relaxed, letting them spread out in front of him. They’re quite slim. The thighs are a bit wobbly. He’s still got the tiniest bit of baby fat, but Louis doesn’t find it off-putting, he finds it adorable. It is somewhat disconcerting to notice that he shaves them, but Louis can work with that. Totally.
The only thing that they’re not, is noticeably injured.
“What about your legs?”
“I have-” Harry pauses to wail again and rub furiously at the joints where his thighs join his hips. “Growing pains!”
Oh.
Louis knows all about growing pains. He suffered them until he was 14, which was years past the age when they were supposed to stop, and god, Harry still has to cope with them at 16 years old and Louis feels immensely sorry for him.
“I don’t have any painkillers.”
Harry screams. Louis flinches.
“I’m sorry babe, I’m so sorry.”
He sighs as he tries to think of a solution to this. He needs to take Harry’s pain away before the entire X Factor House is awoken by his cries.
He thinks back to his early teens, back to the nights where he’d wake his mum up and beg her to make the pain stop. It seems melodramatic now, but at the time it was definitely justified. Growing pains are agonising.
He remembers how his mum would help.
“We’ll get you in the bath, babe.”
Harry nods, doesn’t even question it, so Louis assumes he experiences this pain often enough to know that a tub of warm water can soothe it away.
He helps Harry out of bed with an arm around his back, and he keeps it there all the way down the corridor and to the bathroom that this floor shares, even though Harry can still walk just fine (which is a good sign because if growing pains cause a limp then they are not growing pains at all, they are something more sinister (Louis did a lot of research when he was younger)).
Louis sits Harry on the closed toilet lid, trying to ignore his sobs, a task which is getting easier now as Harry is slowly calming down. The tub doesn’t have two taps but just one, which you can turn left or right to get hot or cold water, respectively. He turns it right, strokes Harry’s curls for about 30 seconds, and then turns it left.
“Do you want bubble bath?”
It’s been left there by someone – presumably Liam.
Harry nods, and Louis notices that look in his eyes that he can only describe as a shine, not dulled even by the agony he’s in. If Louis had Harry’s perspective, he’d know that his own eyes were shining too, and if he had Liam or Zayn or Niall’s perspective, he’d know that both of their eyes always shine when they’re together.
He’s about to unscrew the lid on the bubble bath when he hears footsteps, and the door swings open because Louis didn’t close it properly, and Liam is stood in the doorway in his boxers.
“Oh, sorry guys, are you having a bath?” He seems unfazed by the notion that Harry and Louis might bathe together, even though that isn’t actually the plan. “I just need to use the- Hey! Is that my bubble bath?”
“Oh, sorry mate, I assumed it was open for public use, seeing as it was just left here.” Louis’ voice is playful and there’s a smile on his face, and Liam laughs and shrugs.
“It’s fine. What’s a midnight bath without bubbles? Now shove off for a few seconds, I need to wee.”
Harry groans at the idea of getting up so Louis quickly splashes way too much bubble bath in the hot running water and then wraps an arm around his waist and pulls him up off the toilet seat. “Five minutes, Harry, then you won’t be able to feel a thing but the water, my love.”
My love. When has Louis ever called anyone his love? Well, he decides, Harry kind of is his love…
“I want to feel your arms around my waist, too,” Harry whispers as Louis leads him out of the room to let Liam have his privacy.
Louis’ heart beats hard.
“What, you mean you want me to get in with you?”
He leans against the wall and Harry leans against his chest.
“Yeah. I mean, if that’s not…too weird.”
“No, no, of course not, Haz! We’re best friends, right?”
“Yeah,” Harry agrees, but he seems sad. At least he’s not wailing anymore.
They stand in silence, listening to Liam wash his hands and then pad out of the bathroom. If he’s noticed that Harry’s upset, he hasn’t said anything. He just gives them a smile and goes back to his room.
The tub is not quite full with actual water when they return to it, but Louis turns the tap off because if he lets it flow anymore the bubbles will be flooding the ground. He dips a hand in to check the temperature and it’s perfect. Hot enough to soothe Harry’s aching bones, but not too hot to scold them.
“Right. Strip.”
He stays turned away from Harry as they both get undressed. He doesn’t know why he bothers; they are about to get in the bath together anyway. It just seems like the polite thing to do. He slips into the tub before Harry does. Harry joins him seconds later.
They shift about for a few seconds, letting Harry settle comfortably between Louis’ legs. He’s almost sat on his dick. Louis doesn’t let it bother him. Instead he focuses on the way Harry’s entire body relaxes; he can sense the pain seep away.
Harry sighs, content.
“Do you know what they feel like, Lou?”
“Yeah, Haz. They’re horrible, aren’t they?”
“I’ve got them ever since I can remember. Mum just gives me painkillers and then goes back to bed. I didn’t realise a bath would help this much.”
“Baths do wonders,” Louis smiles. Harry’s a bit taller than him, but he’s slipped down pretty far in the bath as they were talking and his head rests comfortably on Louis’ chest. Louis can’t help it; he kisses him through his curls.
Harry ducks his head – Louis feels rejected for a second, but he notices Harry’s blush and realises it was a bashful head duck, not a ‘get off of me’ head duck.
“You sure it’s not weird, Lou? Being in the bath together?”
“Do you think it’s weird?”
“No. It feels…natural. I fit in your arms. Like I was made to be here.”
It’s Louis’ turn to blush. His heart beats harder still. He finds that happens a lot. Ever since they first met, sort of awkwardly in the bathrooms, Harry’s found little ways to make Louis’ heart beat harder and faster.
Louis never believed in love at first sight. He’s been rethinking his opinion during his time on The X Factor.
He doesn’t know how to respond, so he changes the subject.
“You should try taking painkillers before you go to sleep.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I had a period of a few weeks when I was about twelve, when I would wake up almost every single night in pain. So I started talking Paracetamol before I went to sleep, and it stopped. Well, not completely. Sometimes I’d wake up at like, 6-ish, I think, and be in so much pain, so I’d jump in the bath, and-”
Harry isn’t listening. He’s on his knees, swivelling around in the water to face Louis. He definitely isn’t in pain anymore, Louis can tell that from the smirk on his face and the amplified shine in his eyes.
His heart almost beats out of his chest.
“Thanks for the tips, Lou, but do shut the fuck up and kiss me.”
Louis does just that.
Well, Harry’s the one who leans in and catches his lips with his own, but Louis kisses back just like he was asked, and he would have done it even if he wasn’t asked.
Harry’s lips are wet and a bit salty from all the tears that have dripped onto him, and his breath still tastes a bit like toothpaste, but it’s 3:30am and the minty freshness is wearing off a bit and Louis can mostly just taste Harry’s smell in his mouth.
Louis has kissed a lot of boys in his life and none of them have ever tasted so similar to how they smell as Harry does, but maybe that’s because Louis knows how Harry smells when it’s late at night and his cologne has worn off and he hasn’t had a shower yet so he doesn’t smell like shower gel either.
He doesn’t smell like products, he smells like Harry.
And that’s a smell he can see himself remembering for the rest of his life, and the sensation of the tongue that he just let into his mouth brushing his own is something he wants to feel every day for the rest of his life, and the weight of Harry in his lap is something he wants to support for the rest of his life.
He just wants Harry.
For the rest of his life.
And at this point, Louis isn’t sure if he believes in love at first sight, but he definitely believes in love at first bath.