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One of the lights in aisle three has a busted bulb. There’s a fizzing buzz as it flickers overhead, underscoring the snick of the sticker gun in Liam’s hand. It makes his eyes blink in time, fzz-fzz; like they’re trying to clear away the cobwebs stuck in his lashes.
In the next aisle over he can hear Louis, shoes squeaking rapidly down the floor, and a muted pew-pew slipping though the shelves of boxed cake-mix and hundreds and thousands. Only seconds later, there’s the unmistakeable sound of a can hitting the ground and rolling across the floor, and then footsteps backtracking; a bit-off curse.
Liam blinks again before getting back to task.
It’s nearly closing time, the roller-doors already half-shuttered over the entrance and the check-out staff counting and rolling cash, locking their tills, keys clicking in their place. Michael Jackson plays over the speakers through the near empty aisles, upbeat enough to get the last few stragglers moving a fraction quicker to the last manned register. And through the back door the lights of the loading dock are out, freezers shut tight, boxes stacked, and awaiting the overnight deliverers.
It’s a Wednesday, and Liam’s body is run down to leaden bone after grinding through six days non-stop. It’s a Wednesday, but it’s a Louis day, which means they can race each other on the markdown run, or make laser noises with their sticker guns pointed at each other, and no one will care or say anything, because it’s Louis and that’s what you’ve got to expect. It’s a Wednesday, which means that it’s Liam’s day off tomorrow, and he can sleep in and maybe marathon the Dark Knight trilogy, or take Wilson to the park for a run. It means two more sleeps before he has to wake up and do it all over again.
“Oi, you done?” Louis says, a sliver of face appearing between the chocolate and the lemon and poppy seed cake mix.
Tagging the last few boxes in quick succession, Liam sends out a half-hearted grunt of agreement through the shelves.
There’s a half-second where his body winds down, switch flicking from work mode to rest, and the joints of his bones unscrew from their tight sockets, vertebrae sinking into his spine. And then, not a moment later, Louis is flashing a crinkled-eyed grin at him, and he’s yelling out, far too loud for the abandoned aisles, “Last one to the break room is buying!” and sprinting through the shop like a boy released. Like always, Liam is helpless to do anything but follow.
It’s a twisted race through the shop towards the back, ducking into the storeroom to drop off their sticker guns, and then on to the break room, skidding along the floors. The other staff huff out annoyed breaths as they skirt around them, and there’s a terrifying moment when Louis almost collides with a tall stack of toilet paper, Liam hauling him away just in time. The race is mostly pointless, because Liam knows he’s already lost, but by the time they reach the break room, there’s rejuvenated energy trekking fuel through his veins, and a grin on his face that feels new and almost human.
“Hey,” Louis says when they go to collect their gear, just as Harry announces over the speaker that the shop is now closed. “I’m going out with Zayn on the weekend, do you want to come with? There’s that new place in the NQ, thought we’d make a night of it.”
The only other person in the room is Cher, who’s talking on her phone on the couch, bag already in her lap and hoodie thrown on over her uniform. She waves at Liam, but is too busy telling her husband about a rude customer to pay them much attention.
“Can’t,” Liam says, and when Louis pouts, all droopy like a scolded pup, Liam just rolls his eyes. “You know I can’t, Tommo. I’ve got the Sunday shift, so it’s not like I can go out and get drunk or anything like that.”
“Fuck the Sunday shift,” Louis says. “You can skive off work for one day, Li, it won’t be the end of the world. You never come out with me anymore. It’s fucking annoying.”
Liam shrugs. He opens his locker and retrieves his jumper and messenger bag. This is the third time he’s turned Louis down in the past month, and some part of Liam, still three years back and so lonely and unsure, is silently expecting the day when Louis will stop asking him out at all.
He holds firm to his shapeless resolve, and doesn’t quite look Louis in the eye when he says, “I’ve got to save money. You know that.”
When Louis groans beside him, Liam imagines the force of it pushes at the metal of the locker door between them.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he says.
Not knowing what to say that isn’t a surrender, Liam pulls his jumper over his head, and then checks his phone, which has one notification reminding him he hasn’t played Candy Crush in a while, and one text from his mum asking when he’s going to come round next for tea. Louis doesn't say anything as he sorts through the trash in his own locker for his things. If there were a mirror on the dented door, Liam knows he’d see his own eyebrows trying hard to knit themselves together.
Just as the waves of anxiety begin to swell, they both bang their lockers closed at the same time, and when Liam snaps his head up, he sees Louis looking back at him, a matching surprised grin etched on his face. It reminds him — again, again, again — how much Louis is here to stay.
Simultaneous laughter forces its way unexpected from their mouths, and Cher hushes them from her spot on the couch.
“Sorry,” Liam says to her, and then again to Louis, whose grin softens into a proper smile. “Sorry. I’ll try to switch some shifts around next week, yeah?”
“You better,” Louis says. “Believe it or not, but I miss your ugly mug sometimes. I’ve got important shit to tell you, you know?”
Liam reaches out and squeezes Louis’ shoulder, but Louis just bats him away, only to step into his side for a one-armed hug. As soon as Liam wraps his arms around him, Louis pinches at Liam’s waist, because Louis can make even hugs more difficult than necessary.
“You can tell me now?” Liam suggests, and the response he gets is a bite on the shoulder. In Louis speak, he thinks that probably translates as an okay.
They say goodbye to Cher, and with their bags slung over their shoulders, they head out, Louis rambling about this brilliant album he’d downloaded a few days ago that Liam just has to listen to. Above them, the music has weakly cut off mid-song, only a blur of white noise coming through the speakers, but the melody still continues in Liam’s head, keeping time with the beat of their shoes on the vinyl flooring, store lights slipping underfoot.
Grabbing a Red Bull each from one of the fridges, they head towards Harry’s register. And just like that, three feet from either way, the fuel that’s filtering through Liam’s veins sets itself to indigo burning and turns his cheeks to rust.
On Wednesdays and Saturdays, Harry’s the last one on check-out duty. He’s the last one to wave the staff goodbye, and the last to turn off the lights, and the last lonely outline that Liam sees through the smudged glass of the store. Sometimes, he’s the last thing that Liam sees behind closed eyes at the end of unavailing fantasies; and even then, always there, just out of reach.
He’d started working at the shop at almost the same time as Liam, nearly three years ago. But aside from one humiliating incident at the staff Christmas party that first year, they’ve barely talked beyond a series of hellos and goodbyes so consecutive and uninterrupted that they could be lined up like days of the week.
Unlike Liam, Harry only works part time, and soon he won’t be there at all. A couple of months past he’d finally completed his master’s degree, focusing on business law or jurisprudence, or something else that Liam doesn’t have a hope of understanding. What he does know is that it means that Harry will be able to actually get a job that earns more than seven quid an hour, and all the lasts that Liam’s been stacking up and storing away will all roll into one.
This won’t be the first time Liam’s seen students leave. They come in droves and while away tepid hours through halogen-lit days and nights, before they run off to better things, better jobs, as if this were just a miserable stopgap pitstop on their way to success. Liam’s got pretty good by now at pushing down that ugly feeling of envy that rises up like acid. He’s got pretty good at signing his name in the corner of a congratulatory card under a good luck and well done message he can’t help wishing were for him.
But. Harry, though. With Harry, it seems like the only thing he feels is vague regret and an I’ll miss you that he doesn’t really have any right to.
By the time they get to the checkout, Liam sees that Harry’s shoulders are slumped with exhaustion. The curls in his bun have started to loose themselves free in a greased fuzz of a halo, and there is a new pimple forming near the sparse few hairs on his chin. Liam still thinks he’s gorgeous.
“Hiya, Haz,” Louis says, pushing their Red Bulls along the conveyer belt. He shoos away Liam’s attempts to hand him money, even though Liam had lost their race.
“Hey, Lou. Hey, Liam,” Harry says, and even weighted with exhaustion, his smile is as full-cheeked and sincere as always. Like always, Liam’s tummy does that queer little tumble and his eyes avert to the speckled linoleum of the checkout counter.
“Hey, Harry,” Liam says quietly to the dried smear of strawberry at the corner of the belt. “Had a good day?”
Louis snorts unsubtly beside him, but Harry answers like he didn’t hear, anyway.
“Yeah, it’s been all right,” he says while scanning through the drinks. “Cher almost got into a fistfight with that bloke who tried getting his money back for a half-used pack of, like, faulty smokes, so that was a highlight. Like, there’s something kind of beautiful about the way she manages to talk down to people twice her size.”
“What exactly makes cigarettes faulty?” Louis says.
Liam takes the cans from Harry with a thanks, and tries to ignore how Harry’s answering smile feels where it hits just below his ribs.
“Dunno,” Harry replies. “You tell me, you’re the smokers.”
“Haven’t you heard?” Louis says, and Liam doesn’t know how he manages it, but there’s hyperbolic distaste present in every single syllable. “Liam’s gone clean. Favours his lungs more than keeping me company while I’m having a smoke, apparently.”
“Yeah?” Harry asks, raising his eyebrows, and his eyes look large and bright under the glaring illumination of the fluorescent lights. He’s got shadows like bruises beneath spiked lashes, purple and lovely against his pale skin, and like that bulb is still fizzing above him, Liam blinks, and then blinks again.
“Yeah,” Liam says, shifting in place. He’s suddenly too aware of the stiffness of his limbs. “It’s not really for health reasons or anything. Like, I’m just trying to save a bit and budget, and the cigs didn’t make the cut. It’s been about a month now.”
“A month of loneliness and misery,” Louis mutters, but Harry smiles at Liam. It’s that soft thing, touched with warmth and weariness, and it makes the tips of Liam’s ears burn, coiling restless yearning through the circuits of his veins.
“That’s amazing, Liam,” Harry says, still so earnest. And it’s not really — it’s not really anything except necessity — but Liam’s tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth like peanut butter and he can’t say anything to dispute it.
The pause is filled by the frazzled leavings of the other staff. Aiden walks past them, followed by Elle and Dani, and they call out tired, echoing goodbyes, already buttoned up and ready to face the late night chill. Liam’s gaze follows them, pretending interest when there’s nothing left to say. Outside, the carpark is mostly empty under the yellow glow of the lamps and a hazy starless sky, with only a few solitary cars floating between the lines, and a huddle of teenage boys milling around the kerb, snatches of conversation dissipating into the air like the smoke spiralling from their lips. Abandoned trolleys stray between spotlights, and moths and alates swarm and sizzle in their luminescence, and that’s it, isn’t it? Everything burns in the end.
When Liam’s gaze is pulled back, somewhere wayward in wide green eyes, the thanks he finally gives has Harry’s mouth nudging at his dimple, fifty pence deep. It’s somehow worth more than he’ll ever be able to save, with or without the cigarettes.
With nothing but silence now between them and the clock ticking into overtime, Louis pushes Liam in the side, cocking his head towards the door. After a final thank you and a glance at Harry’s drowsy, hunched form, Liam lets himself be led out the side door and through the car park towards his beaten old hatchback.
Liam unlocks the door and Louis knows the exact way to push and lift the creaking door handle to slide himself into the passenger’s side. His own car is parked not fifteen metres away, but over the years this has become a ritual of sorts — sitting back in their seats at the end of their late shifts, and letting the Red Bull sour their mouths while watching the lights of the store flicker out before them.
Louis turns on the radio as the car warms up against the chill, and they listen to the late easy-listening rotation, drinking quietly and postponing the inevitable. Humming under his breath to Tony Bennett’s smooth tenor, Liam leans back against the headrest, closes his eyes for a moment, and wills the caffeine to set in before Louis’ impatience gets the better of him. At times like this, he wishes he’d never given up smoking.
It’s not long before Louis turns his head in his spot, his hoodie scratching against the seat covers and feet settling against the mat. In the pale dark, the movement holds Liam in place, even if their eyes don’t meet.
“Well, that was about twenty different shades of pathetic,” Louis says, and it’s softer than it is wry. “Jesus, Li. Why don’t you just tell him?”
Incredibly, this is probably only the second or third time that Louis’s said those words aloud in as many years.
“Tell who what?” Liam asks, but it sounds desultory and resigned even to his own ears. He fiddles with the tab on his can and the metal breaks under his fingers.
Louis sighs beside him.
Not even bothering to entertain Liam’s pretence, Louis says, “He’s going to be gone soon. He’ll be gone and you’ll have pined for three bloody years for nothing.”
“I haven’t been pining,” Liam says, brows furrowing. “It’s not like I’ve been Facebook-stalking him or writing him sappy love songs or anything.”
Louis pokes him in the side, and when Liam finally turns to look at him, he reaches out and twists his nipple.
“Ow,” Liam cries, dropping his empty can to grab Louis’ wrist, but Louis just uses his other hand to flick him in the nose and forehead repeatedly. “Jesus. Louis— would you stop—”
“You have been pining,” Louis says, not slowing his assault. “There’ve been pining looks, and pining blushing, and sickening hearts in your eyes, and frankly, I’m done with it! You’re going to tell him, and that’s final.”
“Stop it!” Liam says, finally capturing Louis’ wrists, and holding fast when Louis tries to wriggle free. “I’m not telling him anything!”
Exasperated, Louis exclaims, “Well, why the hell not?”
“Because it doesn’t matter!” Liam says. Under the weak light, Liam sees Louis’ face screw up, like he’s preparing for another fight, and he says it again, voice struggling to remain monotone. “It doesn’t matter. Even if I did tell him, nothing would happen. He doesn’t even like me back.”
When Louis doesn’t say anything, Liam releases his wrists and they both slump back in their seats. They each know the other well enough not to relax entirely.
On the radio, Tony Bennett has switched to Timi Yuro and the lights of the store are out now, only the large sign shining over them, turning the inside of the car as red and as shadowy as a C-grade film. Over the deep, bluesy voice coming from his tinny speakers, Liam can hear his own breath, the shallow wisp of it raking up his throat. Harry will probably be gone by now.
“He kissed you, didn’t he?”
Liam hates how gentle Louis sounds.
He presses his palms into his eyes, before drawing a hand back through his hair, feeling sticky gel between his fingers.
“That was— that was ages ago. And he was completely pissed. It doesn’t count. He probably doesn’t even remember.”
“How do you even know that if you don’t talk to him?” Louis says, but Liam just shakes his head.
“Just let it go, man,” he says quietly.
They sit for a long moment in a settling pall, and then Louis is leaning over the console and wrapping his arms around Liam, until Liam’s face is pressed into the soft of Louis’ neck. Liam’s hands come to grip the soft material of Louis’ hoodie, curling into his waist instinctively.
“I just want you to have something for once,” Louis says, barely perceptible, into Liam’s hair. “I want you to be happy. And I think he might like you back, Li. You know I wouldn’t lie about that.”
Liam just shakes his head into Louis’ hoodie, and it feels irrational that his eyes burn in the face of comfort.
“Yeah,” Liam says softly. “Okay.”
They stay like that for a beat longer, the soothing murmur of the radio wrapping them in the mellow tone of tempered love, and even freshly bruised and battered, there’s still no one that Liam’s more grateful for.
Eventually, Louis pulls back and places a messy kiss on Liam’s cheek, and Liam’s grin is shaky but instantaneous.
“There’s a lad,” Louis says nonsensically, patting Liam’s face, and Liam’s shaky grin lurches into cracked laughter.
They hug again, probably too long for something that’s only a see you soon and not a forever goodbye, and then Liam waits in his car with the lights turned on high beam until Louis makes it safely back to his own car.
Once Louis starts his engine, Liam takes a breath, feeling stupid for the ache of repressed emotion caught in his throat. He pauses himself into something steady, and then the tight hold of his hand is shifting his gearstick into reverse and his car is shuddering out of the park.
Turning up the radio until the slow, rhythmic thrum of the double bass cuts through the car’s scratching speakers, Liam slowly makes his way out of the lot. The streets, quiet and as still as streams, are awash in a yellowish hue. The florist and the dry cleaners are packed up black when he passes them, and even the Chinese takeaway has merely the echoes of an afterglow tinting at darkened windows, shadowing the laminated pictures of fried rice and steamed fish that plaster them. Up ahead, the only sign of life surrounds a late night pizza joint, waiting silently for drunk students to trickle on down from the pub, its sign an almost illegible neon stain on the night.
After work, Liam’s stomach always feels like a dug-out pit, and today, sustained by caffeine and sugar and regret alone, he almost gives in. But, the traffic light in front of him flickers from green to amber, and the radio station announces a Cassandra Wilson rotation. And then, Liam turns his head towards the cold shop fronts and catches sight of a solitary figure pushing a bike with a missing wheel past his car.
Without his permission, Liam’s hand comes down and pulls up the brake, and the other opens the door to the cold. Already half-stepped out of the car, he almost doesn’t recognise his voice when he calls out, wired and wound tight.
“Harry?”
Harry spins around, eyes wide and startled in the dim, and strands of his hair catching the lamplight like warped filament. He looks doe-like, caught in the middle of urban Arcadia, but his shoulders slope under his bulky jacket as soon as his eyes meet Liam’s and it makes Liam’s heart hurt and he doesn’t even know why.
“What are you still doing around?” Harry asks, eyebrows raised in surprised. “Thought you and Lou took off ages ago.”
“Yeah,” Liam says, “we did. We— we were just talking, and we— Harry, what happened to your bike?”
Harry shrugs a little sheepishly, half-grimacing. “Tyre got stolen. It’s actually happened before, so, um, I think I’ve only got myself to blame this time.”
“You should get yourself one of those long chains that you can put through the tyres,” Liam says, and he’s unsure how he’s still got words coming out of his mouth when his mind is nothing but a cluttered mess of half-assembled thoughts and longing.
“Yeah,” Harry says, gesturing vaguely. “But I feel like, then they’d just take something else, wouldn’t they? Like, I’d come back and my seat would be missing or the handlebars. So, I figured, I could be paranoid or I could just not be, right? And then, like, maybe if I used a huge chain then they’d think my bike was more expensive than it is, and then that’d mean someone would steal the whole thing, and I’d have to maybe buy a whole new bike. Do you know what I mean?”
He shrugs again, monologue strung up somewhere between them, and this might be the only proper conversation that Liam’s had with Harry in years.
“I guess so,” Liam says, eyebrows drawing together, and he’s too flustered to compute any of Harry’s logic. “So you’re just— you couldn’t have called anyone to pick you up?”
“Nah. Didn’t want to bother anyone this late. And it’s only an hour walk back. Which, you know—” and he points a thumb over his shoulder, tilting his head.
He’s not made it one pigeon-toed step before Liam’s mouth is gushing words, all of its own accord. “I’ll give you a lift.”
“Oh.” Harry looks just as stunned as Liam feels. “Really? I wouldn’t want to put you out.”
“It’s not. I mean, you won’t,” Liam says, and his heart thuds deeper than that double bass. He has no idea where Harry lives. “Just— I’ll open the boot.”
Fighting down the urge to simply get back in the car and drive away at top speed, Liam manages to push the back seat down and fit Harry’s damaged road bike into the boot, with the front seats pushed right up to the dash. After a struggle with the door, Harry gets in the passenger side, with his knees pressed against the glove box, and his own rucksack and Liam’s messenger bag cradled in his lap.
“Sorry,” Liam says. “It’s a bit small.”
“It’s fine. Better than my bike, anyway,” Harry says, and he’s smiling even while folded up like an awkward pretzel. “I didn’t know you listened to jazz.”
From the radio, You Go to My Head filters through the white static of Liam’s brain. Turning down the volume, and almost overwhelmingly thankful for familiar ground, he says, “Yeah. I’m mostly into R’n’B, but I like lots of different types of music. Louis and I are always swapping albums and stuff.”
Harry smile feels warm, and his fingers trail along the dash to Cassandra’s rich, sweet voice, long and lovely and just as mesmerising. “Yeah? You’ll have to recommend some to me. I feel like I’ve just been listening to the same old tunes over and over again lately.”
It takes a lot for Liam to look away and restart the car, so he can concentrate on the empty road ahead.
“What kind of music do you like?”
The words feel mechanical and badly-shaped as they come out of his mouth, like they’re being read from a scripted card while speed dating, but they’re better than nothing at all. Harry doesn’t seem to notice, though. The stores stream past them in a quickening swell as Liam begins to drive again, and Harry answers, voice calm and unhurried in its rise and fall.
He says, “I guess I like most things, too. Rock, pop, folk. I grew up listening to things like Roy Orbison and Elvis Costello, because that’s the kind of music my dad liked, and Shania Twain and the Coldplay because that’s what my sister, Gemma, liked. And my mum was always into classics, like the Beatles. Ah, turn left just up ahead, please.”
“Sorry, you’ll have to direct me where to go, I don’t have GPS or anything,” Liam murmurs.
“Sure,” Harry says, and then just continues talking, Cassandra singing softly between the slow rhythm of his words. “I had a band in high school with a couple of mates. Played covers of Amy Winehouse and American Authors, and anything we thought would make us look cool.”
In high school there was nothing Liam had wanted more than to sing and be in a band. It’s been years since he’s pulled up Garageband on his laptop and fiddled with remixes that only got a couple dozen views on YouTube. He can’t help thinking that if it were Harry, he would have got thousands.
“I thought I was like Alex Turner or something,” Harry says with an unashamed grin.
Before he can think better of it, Liam says, “I wanted to be the next Justin Timberlake. In high school, I mean. I used to sing, too.”
“You still do,” Harry says, and when Liam shoots a frown at him, he amends, looking a bit chagrined, “I mean, I’ve heard you in the stockroom sometimes. The walls are thin. It doesn’t matter though, because you sound amazing.”
He shrugs a little with a small smile, and Liam wishes the night were dark enough to swallow him up.
He exclaims, suddenly, “I bet you were amazing.”
Harry’s nose screws up a little in a laugh, and it makes Liam smile even though he feels it might be at him. With a shake of his head, Harry says, “God-awful, more like. We tried doing original songs, but could never write lyrics that had any more depth than ‘I think I’m in love and that’s no lie. Please tell me you’re never gonna say goodbye.’ One day Gemma found my, um— God, my lyrics notebook. And she, like— she just sits me down at the kitchen table and goes, ‘Haz. I love you. But you need to stop.’”
An abrupt laugh shakes Liam's chest, enough to make his eyes crinkle into slits like he does in those weird photos that Louis likes to hoard on his phone. He looks at Harry and Harry looks right back at him, grinning almost blindingly under the subdued glow of the dash; like he’s so terribly proud of this horribly embarrassing memory.
Liam thinks, there must be three-years worth of foolish laments coded into his head by now, as certain and on hand as muscle memory. Surely, that should be enough.
Harry blinks at him, slow and acute, like Liam’s this fixed mark in his vision, and Liam swallows hard before turning back to the road.
“That’s not so bad,” he says, voice dipping low while aiming for light. “I bet, like, Chris Martin was writing shit lyrics in his own notebook as a kid. It’s not like he was in the shower one day and thought he’d write a song, and suddenly out came Viva La Vida.”
At the corner of Liam’s eye, he sees Harry grin again, pulling Liam’s bag up to his chest.
“I guess that’s true,” Harry says. “Maybe I shouldn’t have given up so easily. But no, I just rolled over at the first sign of criticism, didn’t I? I could’ve been proper famous by now.”
“Much better than just having a law degree,” Liam says. “Too many lawyers in the world, not enough pop stars, that’s what people always say, isn’t it?”
Liam’s fingers curl white-knuckled around the steering wheel, his heart racing inside of the calm of his words. Harry points right, mottled bokeh swinging over the glide of his outstretched hand and grazing against Liam’s knuckles, and that racing turns to flying, turns to sparking.
“Yeah, something like that, I’m sure,” Harry says, and when Liam risks glancing at him once more, Harry’s looking at him, smile softened from blinding and closer to unbearable. “Where were you eight years ago when I needed to hear that, Liam Payne?”
Probably just waiting for you, Liam thinks. He says, “Allowing talent to go to waste, obviously.”
Harry laughs, even though it wasn’t really funny. “Obviously. Because there was so much talent and all. Um, take the next right and then an immediate left, please.”
Off the main street the yellow light merges into the midnight blue of midnight trees, and when Liam casts his eyes sidewards, he sees the flickering shadows smoothing over Harry’s pale skin, and the line of his jaw, half-cut between too young and sweet and wondrously masculine. The bones in Liam’s chest tighten across his heart, and he bites into his lip, and there’s no doubt in him that Harry could’ve been anything he’d wanted — that there could never have been any reason for Harry to ever wish he were more than he is.
“When are you going to quit?” Liam blurts out, and then, hastily, “I mean, Louis says that you’re going to go off and get a proper job soon now that you’ve graduated.”
Harry’s voice is gentle as he says, “A cashier is a proper job. But, I’m not leaving for a few weeks yet.” His fingers knit into the strap of Liam’s messenger bag, and he pulls it even closer to his chest, chin almost buried in his rucksack. “Besides, I’m not actually going to be a lawyer. I got an internship with a legal ombudsman, so hopefully I can get into that.”
“I’m not sure what that is,” Liam says, “but it sounds very professional. Like you’d have your own business cards, or one of those wooden blocks with your name engraved on it on your desk.”
“Maybe,” Harry says with a small shake of his head, and his voice is muffled a bit by his rucksack. “I dunno if I’m looking forward to it, really. I kind of like being a cashier.”
Liam almost stops the car with the immediate surge of incredulity. “Why?”
There’s a shrug that pushes Harry’s shoulders up to his ears. “I like talking to people. I feel useful knowing that I’m giving people things they need. And like, I’ll miss you guys.”
Harry rests his cheek against his rucksack and looks at Liam again, soft under midnight blue and blurred light, and God, does Liam mean it when he says, “I— We’ll miss you, too.”
Harry presses his face back into his bag, but Liam thinks there might be a smile somewhere there, dog-eared with a dimple.
“I’m just up ahead,” he says quietly, pointing. “The house with the roses.”
It feels like mere seconds have passed since Harry stepped into his car.
Not without reluctance, Liam pulls up at the side of the road and helps Harry take his bike out of the back. Almost without meaning to, he carries it up the drive, holding it while Harry fumbles with his keys.
“You can come in?” Harry says, more of a question than a statement as he holds the door open, and Liam’s legs follow through automatically, placing the bike just inside the entrance where Harry haphazardly flaps his hand.
When Harry pushes the door closed solidly behind them, it’s like the blue-black sky takes an inhaled breath, and then Liam with it.
Inside is a world that Liam’s tried not to dream of. Looking around, Harry’s place is filled with furniture that appears to have seen better days, with pale brown walls and pock-marked wooden floors, and a light that only illuminates one half of the room. There are piles of shoes scattered next to the entrance; boots that Liam’s positive are Harry’s and high-tops that he’s positive aren’t. A small kitchen looks out over the living area, and Harry takes off the shoes he’s wearing before dropping his jacket and his rucksack next to the couch and padding towards the fridge, leaving Liam to do the same and trail uncertainly behind him.
“Do you want something to eat? As a thank you for the lift home?” Harry says, and he’s already pulling some eggs out of the fridge, and some fish fingers out of the freezer. “It won’t be much, but you must be as starving as I am after a shift.” Liam’s stomach growls, forever ill-timed, and Harry quirks a grin at him, saying, “Right.”
In the kitchen, Harry’s movements are as practiced as they are behind a check-out, and Liam finds himself leaning awkwardly against the counter, trying to figure out how the night has lead him here while Harry natters on about his housemate, Niall, and how his cat has scratched up the chairs so badly that they probably won’t get their bond back. Said cat wanders briefly into the kitchen, winding around their legs and purring until it realises it’s not getting a second dinner, and then exiting the room once more.
Liam barely registers any of it. There are wisps of hair curling loosely at Harry’s nape and the shirt that was under his jacket is worn thin, pinned high by his broad shoulders, and draping loosely over the small of his hips and waist. There’s a dip at the bottom of his back, because Harry’s always hunched a bit, like he thinks he’s taking up too much space, and there’s an indent in his spine where Liam could press the heel of his palm when he pulls him in. It hurts, how much Liam wants him.
“Sorry, I’m not talking too much, am I?” Harry says, as he plates up the eggs and fish fingers on toast.
“No. It’s fine,” Liam says. “I— I like listening to you talk.”
The look that passes across Harry’s face is one that Liam can’t quite decipher, something in pinched eyebrows and pursed lips. But then he’s nodding and handing over Liam’s plate, and with gentle fingers guiding at Liam’s elbow, Harry says, “Come on. Let’s eat on the couch. We don’t really have a proper table.”
Liam gets directed to the couch, and when he sits down, he sinks into the sagging middle, knees pressed together. Harry doesn’t join him straight away, but goes over to a docking speaker on a bookshelf and fiddles with the iPod one-handed until he seems satisfied, the rhythmic, low beat of a kick drum and a steel-stringed guitar filling the room, smooth and heavy like the brown walls and the wooden floors, the velveteen cushions and the half-light hanging over them.
As Harry sits next to him, the couch declines even further, and he’s only a handbreadth away. Even with the music playing, the fall of Harry’s breath and the soft depression of the cushions, crinkling fibres and static lint, sound like the loudest things in the room.
“Go on,” Harry says, nudging Liam and giving him a lopsided grin, so warm within the sepia room. “It’s not brilliant, but it won’t kill you. Promise.”
On the top of Liam’s fried egg he had seen Harry had drawn a ketchup smiley face. With fingers as stiff as traps, and tongue cardboard dry, Liam picks up the butty and makes a show of biting in and making a noise of appreciation around the mouthful, until Harry looks away, his smile pushing up under the wrinkles by his eyes.
“Yeah, all right,” Harry says, laughter edging his words, and for a moment Liam allows himself to think about how it’s just for him; allows himself to think there could be more, just for him.
The music slides into acoustic harmonies, and Liam scrunches his socked toes into the wooden floor and says, “I’m not making fun. It’s good. I’ve never had a fried egg on a fish finger butty before.”
“Cheers,” Harry says, and there’s still a laugh there, as if he doesn’t quite believe him. “Niall told me I shouldn’t mess with a classic, but I think it adds that extra something. Plus, when you’re a struggling student, sometimes you’ve got to get creative.”
Liam tries not to whisper it when he says, “Or just poor in general.”
“That, too,” Harry says, and he’s looking at him again, like he’s trying to see more than what Liam has to offer. “You said that you quit smoking to save money?”
Liam nods, wiping the crumbs and butter from his mouth. “Yeah. I’ve always been kind of shit at it, but I promised myself I’d try to be better this year. My sister helped me draw up a whole budget over Christmas and everything. It mostly means that I’ve been going to tea at my parents’ a lot more, to be honest, and that half of my pay goes into my savings before I can spend it all.”
The thing is — and this he hasn’t even told Louis — is that Liam’s not even sure what he’s saving for yet; the only thing he knows is that he needs a change and changes generally need money.
Harry asks, “Did you go cold turkey?”
“That’s the only way to do it, isn’t it?” Liam says, and Harry nods around a mouthful of butty. “Just, like, rip the Band-Aid off and get it over and done with.”
“Maximum pain, maximum gain,” Harry intones wisely between bites of food, and Liam can’t help laughing, even before he sees Harry’s cheeks cutting into a grin.
From the speakers, there’s a serene tone to the harmonies melting into the gliding rhythm of the acoustic guitars, words like hooked lines pulling at the wires in Liam’s chest, fashioning them into something almost whole. A busted globe above, dimming the room like a clouded sky, and Harry’s eyes on him like earth-bound stars, and he doesn’t know why, but there’s a feeling — gold-tinged night and cold wind raking across the gravel, and Liam, here and present, charting unknown roads and navigating unknown worlds. It’s chaos inside him, but a wanted chaos. Never has he allowed himself to want so much.
With nothing but crumbs and yolk smearing his plate, Liam moves to take their dishes into the kitchen. But, before he can, Harry’s hand is on his arm, tugging him down. The plates are taken from Liam’s grip and placed on the floor next to the couch, and then Harry is turning his body towards Liam’s, wiping his fingers on his jeans and licking his lips; twisting Liam’s nerves with each swipe of his tongue.
“So,” Harry says, and Liam’s eyes move between his grease-shined lips to the cat-clawed cushions. “Do you think— do you want to come out with me on Friday? One of my mates is playing a gig at a pub. He’s really good. I think you’d like it.”
“I’ve got work on Friday,” Liam says, before he can stop himself. “And you do, too.”
“It doesn’t start until late,” Harry says, and Liam feels a bit stupid, like he should have already known that. Of course Harry wouldn’t skip out on work. “We could go after. If you wanted.”
“I— okay.” Liam’s words stick in a murmur, but he wants this, almost desperately.
When Harry presses their legs together, Liam looks up and he’s so close, and his eyes are still doe-like, so vast with green-leafed youth.
“Do you maybe want a beer?” he asks, and Liam shakes his head.
“Can’t. Still got to drive back, don’t I?”
Harry is looking at him, gaze straight and unwavering, but his next words are as low and gentle as the dim light. “You don’t have to drive back.”
“What,” Liam says, swallowing hard, “and stay here?” and Harry shrugs, lip caught between his teeth and eyes wide.
The acoustic guitars and that soothing sound fall into silence, and to Liam it feels like this moment has been pushed to a precipice. Harry’s hand raises in an aborted movement, and then he’s shifting, warm thigh inching over Liam’s, and Liam’s breath falls heavy, ragged as unthreaded string.
“Liam— just. Please, tell me if I’m reading this wrong. Like, am I making a complete arse out of myself? Again?”
“What do you mean?” Liam whispers, and there’s a shake in his voice that’s been trying to make itself known all night.
“I thought—” Harry says, and then he stops himself; pauses. He takes a deep breath, but when he looks back at Liam, there’s a sadness there and absolutely no discernible reason why. “Do you remember? A few years back? We were at the staff Christmas party and I kissed you?”
Liam wouldn’t have thought it was possible for his whole world to fall out of the bottom of his stomach in only a couple of sentences. He hates how embarrassment can still feel so fresh long after the event, and he presses his lips together like it might just quake out of him, hot through his cheeks and hot in the sting behind his eyes.
“Yeah. I remember,” Liam says. “Do you remember?”
“What? Liam, of course I remember. I kissed you and then you pushed me away,” Harry says, and his hands are gesticulating now.
Liam’s brows furrow together, because that’s— that’s not how it happened at all. “Harry, you were so drunk—”
“And I was so embarrassed,” Harry interrupts, voice going thin. “I thought I’d misread the whole thing. I thought I’d thrown myself at you—”
And that, Liam doesn’t understand; can’t think of any reason why Harry would have thrown himself at Liam in the first place.
Especially since— “You called me Louis, Harry.”
Harry stops gesticulating and pauses. “What?”
“You called me Louis. When we were kissing,” Liam says, and he can feel the deep burn in his cheeks, that rush of humiliation that has his fingers tightening into fists at his knees. “You didn’t even know who I was.”
“Fuck,” Harry says. “Fuck, Liam, I never realised. God.” He buries his head in his hands for a moment, and when he looks up he looks regretful and sad, lines thinned around his eyes. “I’d just met you both, and I must have got confused. It must have just slipped out. Liam. I didn’t mean it, I swear.”
“But you said it,” Liam says quietly.
“Yeah,” Harry says, and it’s just as quiet, “I guess I must have. I was drunk. And you stopped kissing me.”
“Yeah,” Liam says. “Didn’t want to kiss you if you were thinking of someone else.”
“I wasn’t,” Harry says, softly. “Promise. I only wanted to kiss you.”
Liam thinks back to that night, of Harry’s hands under his jumper and his thigh slipping between his legs — the desperation of it all that still lingers deep and intense even after all these years. All that fumbling under all that faded light.
The screws in Liam’s ribs loosen and tighten. Liam thinks, maybe some changes come at a different kind of cost.
He asks, “Do you still want to kiss me?”
Liam has spent so many endless nights set adrift, swimming through the same empty streets. So many lost and lonely nights.
That broken bulb bleeds its fractured light upon them, and Liam blinks and when he opens his eyes he is still here. He is here.
He asks, hopes fashioned into the form of a question, and Harry’s answering touch pulls like gravity, guiding him through wanted darkness.