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There are violets mingling with the grass and every property is lined with a rustic brown fence that holds in but doesn’t hold back. That’s the thing about growing up in Maryland. There’s a lot of nothing. Or at least there was a lot of nothing before Harry started paying attention.
Most wouldn’t really be able to pinpoint a moment like that, but the truth of the matter is that Harry started noticing things when his best friend pushed him into a stall door and kissed him with what felt like love but was what Harry now knows to be lust.
Harry paid attention to a lot of things in those few seconds, but has now, even all this time later, amounted to a list of two being the most important.
– That was the last day they said “I love you” to each other. (It took Harry four weeks and a kiss on the cheek from his mother to realize the meaning had changed.)
– Louis had spent twenty minutes picking the purple flowers from the grass and putting them into Harry’s hair. He knocked each one out with his very own fingers.
✿ ✿ ✿
The Maryland Hunt Cup is kind of a big deal. Harry can barely remember a spring without going and only a few without Louis’ family’s car parked next to theirs, tents set up together and enough food to feed an army.
Louis looks good.
He’s got on the standard for the boys – navy blue blazer, pinstriped blue and white button down, and beige trousers that probably weren’t tailored to suit his ass but get the job done anyway. His aviators and wind-swept hair aren’t really helping, but if Harry’s put up with this for the past six years, he can do it for one final time.
They drove together, the two of them, past miles and miles of green grass and rolling hills, in Louis’ shiny red pick-up. Harry wonders what all this means to Louis; if these fields are past, present, or future. Harry knows it’s his everything, but he can’t picture a senior year without a red truck waiting in his driveway each morning. The stop sign they roll up to tells him he’s going to have to make do.
Niall greets them with a six pack of IPA. He’s wearing a pink shirt. Bless his heart, honestly. Harry takes one off his hands immediately for the walk to the cars and tents further up the hill where his and Louis’ moms are surely set up. Surely, because they arrived an hour and a half earlier, leaving Louis and Harry to feed and turn out the horses, leaving them with the leeway to take another half hour to themselves. Surely, because they were making out in the hay loft and tack room and the back seat of Louis’ truck.
Yet, they arrive like spring, a little late but more than welcome.
They’re sucked into the masses of blazers and sun dresses and Ray Bans and floppy hats. This is where Harry is in his element, why he likes events of this caliber so much. On the way to their tent, they kiss cheeks and shake hands, ask and answer the simple questions – “How’s [insert daughter/son/horse name here]?” and “School going well, young man?” And of course, school is never going anything less than well. Louis keeps an arm around his shoulders, nudges him when they pass the man taking bets so he can spend the cash his mom gives him for working so hard in the barn. He doesn’t bat an eyelash when Louis grabs the wallet from his back pocket, and that’s when he realizes perhaps he should.
They put money on number 12, like they always do. It’s become a tradition between them, from back when Harry didn’t observe like he does now. Louis probably knows how it started. It feels too strange to ask him; like nostalgia on his tongue.
Anyhow, Harry’s never liked the number twelve for any reason other than that one. It’s too easy – too divisible and large. But still, they bet on twelve because it’s what they do, even if it’s a rider or a horse that is competing against the odds. They’ve never won the bet.
✿ ✿ ✿
“I can’t believe you’re saving yourself.”
Harry scowled and turned his back to finish grooming Celeste. She was a big brown babe and sometimes Harry wondered if she might love him more than Louis does.
“It’s not for marriage or anything,” Harry groaned. He’d explained this at least three times before, and Louis was still trying to break him down. “It’s just for someone who loves me. Or close enough to it.” Everything inside Harry’s ribcage burnt as he picked Celeste’s hooves. Her legs were light in his grip, and it was refreshing compared to whatever he was feeling. If he and Louis were a whole, they’d have been feeling in halves.
“You sound ridiculous,” Louis told him, “like some twelve-year-old girl who’s still convinced she’s never gonna smoke weed or drink alcohol.”
“Thanks,” Harry gritted out. He threw Celeste’s saddle on too quickly and immediately felt bad for taking out the anger on her. “You just don’t get it. Sorry you wasted your virginity on some bitch you don’t even like.” Harry was rarely this mean. Louis took it like a brush of fingers to his back. Nothing.
Harry mounted and began to walk away, knowing Louis would follow. “Fuck virginity!” he shouted. Surely not thinking of how grateful he should have been for an empty barn and a friend who could get him in when he shouldn’t have been able to. “It’s just some myth made up by the patriarchy so girls can be belittled by the men who have something else to take away from them.”
“You’re part of the patriarchy!” Harry growled, pushing Celeste into a trot to get away, even though Louis has always had the bigger, faster horse. More guts, too.
“So are you, Harry! You’re a boy!” Louis argued. He was pushing. He always pushed Harry. To do more, to be more, into whatever this was. “Why do you always get so worked up about this?”
“Why do you always bring it up?” Harry cried. He sniffled, started to work Celeste up more and more. Louis didn’t answer. “You’re my friend. You’re supposed to value my opinions.”
With that, they jumped the fence and were off into the rolling fields of Maryland, riding together but still feeling in halves.
✿ ✿ ✿
Three weeks later, Harry let Louis have sex with him. Harry might not have been sure if Louis loved him, but he was as sure as hell in love with Louis. He just hoped that Louis would get the subliminal message, just this once, that arose by letting this happen.
✿ ✿ ✿
By the time they get to the tent, the afternoon is in full swing, sun shining on the tops of burning silver cars and canopy shielding the food from spoiling heat. Puffy clouds roll across the blue sky, and Harry loves to see Louis’ sisters running around grass, eating homemade rice crispy treats and trying not to get stains on their pretty little dresses.
Their parents are sipping white wine out of plastic glasses and there are piles of food, only half touched but will surely be gone come four or five. From behind the frames of Harry’s sunglasses, everything looks wonderful.
“What a sight,” Louis says. “I’m gonna miss this.”
Harry’s heart twists in his chest, but he brings himself to shove Louis anyway. “Fuck off. You’ll come back after school.”
“Who knows,” Louis mutters. “New York might take me by storm.”
You’re a prick, Harry wants to say. You’re a prick and I hate you. It’s because Louis does this on purpose. He knows that Harry hates when he talks about it. He knows that it makes his chest burn and his eyes do that stupid thing where they start to water up.
“Who knows,” Harry says instead, taking another swig of his beer and trying to ignore the way Louis squeezes his shoulder a little bit harder.
✿ ✿ ✿
“Y’know, I think I want to go to school in New York City,” Louis told him.
“What?” Harry said, because. What. Louis loved it here. He was a country boy. Him, in a city?
“It seems cool,” Louis muttered.
They were sitting on the fence in front of Harry’s house. It was pre-truck, so Louis’ bike was resting in the driveway. They were playing their favorite game of count the car, and so far they were at four. Pretty good for twenty minutes.
“Cool?” Harry said. “Good luck finding a nice stable. Or a fucking field.”
Louis looked at him with raised eyebrows and a little bit of fear at Harry’s sudden abrasiveness. Carefully, he put a hand on Harry’s shoulder. Harry fought so hard to not shrug it off. If he was a mine, the whole thing had just come crashing in. “Calm down, I’m just thinking.”
“Have you even been?” Harry asked, trying to control himself, taking a breath.
“Once, when I was twelve. It was a spring break thing, I think. I liked it.”
Harry huffed. “That was five years ago.”
“I’ve been to other cities. I’m a man of extremes, Harry. What can I say? Either the middle of nowhere, like here, or the center of everything, like New York. I think it could be really fun.”
Harry had to hold back from coughing on the word could. It wasn’t really about the city, Harry knew this even then. It was about the four hour drive that would inevitably separate them; Harry stuck in the fields living the dream in the only world he’d ever known while Louis was off living in another universe.
“What school?” Harry asked, because he was going to listen he had to know.
“NYU, maybe. I’ve looked at their website. It seems really, really good.”
Harry crossed his arms, in the process ridding his shoulder of Louis’ hand. Fingers had been rubbing circles. He felt a little freer, like before, Louis had been able to read his thoughts through the simple touch of skin. “You think you can get in?”
Louis paused for a second. “Probably. I’ve got the grades. And the resumé.”
“Yeah?” Harry laughed. “What kind of charity have you been working on?”
Louis scoffed, jumping from the fence and holding out his hands for Harry to take. “Are you kidding, H? I’ve been working on you since you were ten years old.”
Harry rolled his eyes and kneed him in the chest instead of taking his hands.
New York.
✿ ✿ ✿
When it’s finally time for the race, Harry and Louis, with Niall, Liam, and Zayn trailing close behind, head down to the fields, sitting on the fence for the start. After making their rounds in the paddocks, seeing their friends who are riding and chasing, they’re aware of the nerves buzzing throughout the course. It’s always like this, with jumps over five feet high and a four mile run. The fields are stunning, ground just softened enough from the rain that poured down the night before.
Sitting on the fence feels like all of the years before, like all of the times they sat watching the races, but for a reason Harry knows but refuses to acknowledge, today feels like an end. As soon as the horses are off, they boys watch the first jump and hop off the fence, running across the course in a frenzy, lapels of their blazers flapping in the wind to catch the fifth jump, and then again to catch the seventh, watching the riders either soar over the fences with ease or stumble and fall, horses running and riders writhing.
The race is a mess, as it always is. They run across the road back to the finish to see the end, only four riders coming in and the fifth horse without a man on his back. Number twelve doesn’t cross the line, but it’s not a surprise. They’re panting and out of breath, the five of them glancing at each other with grins and Harry keeps worrying what if I don’t see them again.
In nine minutes, eleven riders failed to finish and four felt on top of the world, Harry still trying to enjoy but thinking and noticing all too much.
✿ ✿ ✿
The first time Harry saw Louis, he was already starry-eyed. It was a little less because of his pretty blue eyes and amazing body or how many pull ups he could do on the wooden doorway, but more because he was eleven and had the horse of Harry’s dreams. His name was Thor and he was big and black and much too large for Louis’ small frame, still laden with baggy clothes and perfected with a spikey haircut that no one should really have.
Harry was drawn to him from the first time he jumped the fence, watching Thor try to act up but Louis not letting him. Maybe he was drawn to Louis’ power, because even at his age he knew how to take a horse and make him listen.
Mommy had said that they were getting a new boarder, one who had just moved in. And because Harry, fearless at ten years old, decided he liked him, they collided day after day.
“Your horse is awesome,” Harry said.
“I know,” Louis answered. But as if he was remembering the manners his mother tried so hard to embed in him, he adds, “but thanks.”
“No problem,” Harry mumbled. “Can I ride him?”
Louis looked at him with offense. “No.”
They stayed friends anyway.
✿ ✿ ✿
“Come sit on the hill with me?” Louis asks, after they’ve gotten new beers and are no longer out of breath from running across the course.
Harry swallows. “Yeah. Of course.”
They walk up the grass with brushing backs of hands, and Harry feels stupid and younger than seventeen when he asks, “Can I hold your hand?” And what he can’t decide is what’s more pathetic: that they don’t hold hands already or the fact that he has to ask to do so.
Louis looks at him with sideways eyes from behind his sunglasses, like he hadn’t noticed their fingers before. Harry wants to flinch, wants to curl in on himself, but instead he keeps walking, feeling the pull at the back of his calves as they make their way up the incline.
An answer takes longer than one should – the amount of time that means the situation is awkward; versus suspiciously quick, it’s painstakingly slow. He forces his back to the long grass and the way his feet don’t seem to deter it. He hears Louis swallow as he takes another sip of his beer and Harry isn’t one for jumping to conclusions but the alcohol making its way into Louis’ system stings because everything in Harry knows that that was for him.
“Will that make you happy?” Louis asks – and that’s something that Louis has always been good at: deflection.
Harry would writhe if he wasn’t walking up the hill, if they weren’t about to reach the apex of a summit that’s not even so high up, for their world. “Not if it won’t make you happy.”
They find a spot in the grass. Harry watches Louis’ hand turn into a fist, the other tighten around the neck of his bottle. “You know I like touching you,” he says.
Harry should be angrier, but there’s only wallowing, wind-blown dandelion sadness swirling around in the part of his tummy and throat where the emotions like to hang out. “And you know how this is different.”
“Just hold my fucking hand, you dick.” He tangles their fingers together with too much force, crushing hands but calming quickly, because they fit together and despite what either of them may think, this is familiar between childhood and playfulness and that level of desperation that Harry might reach when he forces their fingers together when they fuck, looking for a sense of something and hating the way he feels it.
Harry relents, because that’s the thing about having. Even if the getting is falsified, the won parts of having still outweigh whatever guilt work their way into him. His palm doesn’t sweat, though, just sits next to Louis’ and feels his pulse even though the reminder that Louis is alive doesn’t do anything but worry him more.
“What’s up, H?” Louis starts, soft and knowing and positively ruinous. “You’ve been off all day.”
And that’s when Harry is reminded that for all that he knows about Louis, Louis knows him just as well. He can tell a bad day when it’s there. It’s comforting and concerning at once. Harry sighs. “It’s just been a weird day.”
“How so?” Louis asks. “This is usually your favorite day of the year.”
“It still is,” Harry argues weakly. “It just feels weird.”
Louis laughs softly, fondly, Harry supposes. “You said that already, Harry.”
“I know. I just don’t know how to explain it.” Harry picks at the grass with the hand that’s not holding onto Louis, twisting it around his fingers before uprooting it and then feeling bad for taking it from its home. He stops on a leaf and just rubs it between the pads of his thumbs.
“You do,” Louis pushes, and he knows and he knows and it feels – believe it or not – weird that he knows. “You don’t have to tell me though.”
Harry looks down, his hair falling over his eyes. “It feels like an end. Y’know? Like –”
“Because I’m going to school?” Louis interrupts, saving him from falling into a mess of his words.
“Yeah,” Harry whispers. “I mean, for the most part, yeah. I just feels like everything is closing and I don’t like it. Change scares me. I’m not used to it.”
Harry has always found it too easy to be honest around Louis, and at this point, there’s only one thing he hasn’t admitted. He remembers kindergarten and they’d always say it’s good to be honest it’s good to be honest it’s good to be honest but Harry never remembers honesty making him feel better than saying nothing at all.
For a moment Harry is worried that Louis is going to make a joke of it. Laugh, maybe grin, say something like, “You not gonna be able to function without your better half?” But he seems to know better, just squeezes Harry’s hand a little and says, “You’ll be able to do it, H. It’s not gonna be that different. It’s only a year, anyway.”
Right. Only a year anyway.
✿ ✿ ✿
Harry and Louis were only caught once, and it was by someone who didn’t even remember. There was a house party on the last night of summer one August, when Harry was just fifteen and Louis was already diving head first into his Junior year. The house was wild; a cliché, almost, with loud music that shook the hill the house sat upon and red solo cups everywhere. The only contradiction to the parties like these were the dresses that the girls wore and the ties that sat loosened around the boys’ necks.
They were handsy from the start, Louis’ fingers finding Harry’s belt loop and Harry’s fingers desperately trying to stay out of Louis’ hair. The idled on the back of his neck, sometimes leaving goosebumps in their wake. It was only after four beers and a shot each that they surrendered themselves, going to a bathroom upstairs and locking the door behind them.
Their breaths were heavy and heady, eyes no longer wandering to avoid each other, but meeting and not straying. Harry put a hand on Louis’ waist, brought him closer.
Louis rolled his eyes. “Maybe we shouldn’t go to parties together.”
Harry frowns. “Why not?” He might have been slurring a little. “You’re my best friend. We have to party together.”
“Yeah,” Louis started slowly. “But it’s no fun if we can’t hook up when we’re drunk. You’re irr-irregula– irresistible, Styles.”
“Why can’t we hook up when we’re drunk?” Harry asked. He pulled Louis even closer, so their chests were brushing. Harry kissed his neck and Louis laughed.
“We can hook up in here, idiot,” Louis muttered, almost fond but not quite. He raps his knuckles against the door behind him, the one Harry’s pushed up against. “I meant out there.”
“We could, if you want.” Harry was drunk and stupid. He still has to tell himself that.
“Are you joking?” Louis growled. “Everyone would think we were dating.”
“Is that a problem?” Harry dared to ask.
“Of course it’s a fucking problem. We hook up, Harry. It’s different.”
Different. Right. Harry blamed his stupidity on his drunken stupor. So he just reached out and kissed him, let their hot mouths connect, tasting grossly of beer but mostly of Louis. They strayed from the door to Harry being pressed up against the sink, then him sitting on the closed toilet seat with Louis on his lap, all wandering hands and wandering mouths, cares only hidden in their drunken fucking world.
They broke apart when the door opened, revealing a Niall clad in a trashy royal purple button down that everyone commended him for. “Oh,” Niall said. “What’s up, guys?”
What’s up? Louis was pressed against the wall opposite the toilet, adjusting himself in his jeans, and Harry was still sitting dumbly on the porcelain seat, boner obvious and hair mussed up.
“Can I piss?” Niall asked.
“Wait, what the fuck?” Louis muttered. “We locked the door.”
Niall just laughed. “This one doesn’t work. Someone brought Jack! Go take another shot.”
Louis did just that. Harry bit the inside of his cheek.
✿ ✿ ✿
Harry’s never gone straight home after any race. This time, he and Louis sit in the car for ten minutes before he actually puts it into drive and gets them onto the road.
“Where are we going?” Harry asks.
“The barn,” Louis answers easily, drumming his fingers on the wheel in a beat that doesn’t match that of the song that’s playing softly from the stereo.
“Any reason in particular?”
Louis just shakes his head at him. “Do we ever need a reason to go anywhere?”
With the two of them, no, Harry supposes, maybe they don’t.
Once parked, Harry mutters something about visiting the foal and Louis jumps at the chance, running from his car to the paddock where she’s staying with her mom. He skids to a stop to make sure Harry’s following.
“You’re pretty cute, you know that?” Harry calls after him, because he’s just so excitable, full of energy. Harry loves him so much it hurts.
Louis scoffs, hopping the fence and turning around to look at Harry fully, blue eyes careful as Harry ambles toward him, hands in his pockets and loafers quiet on the green grass of spring that they’ve both come to love so much. “I expected more from you, H. Besides, you can’t really be calling me cute when we’ve got this little girl here.” He gestures to the foal, Atlas, nursing from her mom. “She’s the cutest out of us all.”
Harry shrugs in agreement, taking his time to get to the fence and staying behind it to watch Louis play with the filly, giving her rubs and scratching behind her ears. “Would you rather me call you pretty?” Harry asks after a moment’s silence. Or rather, a lack of conversation. There’s still the wind in the leaves and Louis making noises at Atlas and the birds and frogs chirping.
Louis turns to look at him, laughing with his mouth but his eyes, too. Always so bright. “I’ll take what I can get, I guess.” He steps away from Atlas and she runs off, chestnut coat still new and shiny. She runs and bucks and rears, and Harry wonders what it feels like to be that free, even when they’re closed into a paddock.
✿ ✿ ✿
Only a few months after the commencement of their friendship, the foal was born. At this point, Louis had found a soft spot for Harry, and even if he didn’t always show it, Harry knew it was there because Louis would smile all big when Harry let him touch his hair. Plus, Harry got to ride Thor sometimes, so it couldn’t possibly mean anything else.
The horse’s name was Caesar, born black and big from the start. He was their first male baby – somehow their barn was always getting little fillies – and he was magnificent; full of charisma and energy.
Harry knew Louis would love him, so the first time Harry took Louis to see a foal, he was two months past his eleventh birthday and ready to impress.
“His name is Caesar,” Harry said proudly, walking toward the paddock that they passed each day, where the little black horse always contrasted so beautifully with his white mother.
“I know, Harold.” Louis had snark even at twelve. He was astounding in a way that gave Harry goosebumps before he even know why he was getting them. “Just because I haven’t played with him yet doesn’t mean I don’t know his name. He’s the talk of the barn!”
Harry ducked his head, smiled at his dusty boots. “Right. Sorry. Anyway, my mom said we can go in and pet him, but we need to stay away from his mom because she’s really protective and might get mean. Also, he bucks.”
Louis just scoffed, crouched to pick a violet and chuck it Harry’s way before sliding his skinny body under the fence and letting things come to him – as they like to do. The mom, Athena, just grazed as Louis made eye contact with little Caesar, holding out a hand and talking with his eyes. He approached slowly, and Louis knew not to move. Harry just stood outside the fence in wonder and admiration, rubbing the violet Louis had picked for him between his fingers.
Caesar suddenly bounced, bounding to Louis in a jolt and stopping to nudge his hand. He let himself be pet. Harry was in love with Louis; palms as they touched this new life of two weeks with such ease.
“Look, Harry!” Louis exclaimed. His face was alight with joy. “He’s so sweet!” His voice softened for the horse. “You like when I scratch your ears, little horse? You have to come here, H! He’ll love you!”
See, this is how it went. Harry aimed to impress and only wound up being more blown away by Louis himself. It carried on that way.
✿ ✿ ✿
Louis gets carried away, because once he’s at the barn he’s sucked in, absorbed by the atmosphere. So he pulls on Harry’s arm until he agrees to go out with him. They tack up when they shouldn’t be. Harry is so thankful that his mom trusts him, because this is dangerous, but familiarly so. They always go out at dusk, especially on days like these when the barn is closed and no one’s really meant to be here.
Louis is an asshole about it, not even brushing Phoenix off – his latest beauty, an Arabian who never seems to tire out – and mounting while he watches Harry take his sweet time. Louis circles around the track while Harry pulls Brooklyn’s tail with a comb just to be annoying. He’s yelling, “Hurry up, loser!” All the while, Harry is moving slower than he has to. He’s telling himself it’s because he wants to irritate Louis, engage their little game of back and forth banter and teasing that he always loses, but part of him knows that he’s prolonging this night as much as he can.
Eventually Louis surrenders on being rude about it, slowing right by Harry’s head and stroking the top of his hair. “H,” he starts, “can we go now please? It’s gonna get dark soon and I really want to go for a run.” Harry wants to lean up and push into his touch, but instead lets his fingers walk along his knee for a second. He saddles Brooklyn in a few seconds, pushing her bridle into her mouth with ease and trying not to feel guilty when her ears flick back as he tightens his girth. He mounts from the floor, making eye contact with Louis before taking off.
Harry loses because he always does, but he loves how ridiculously freeing this is – their blazers flying around in the wind and their slacks still on, helmets looking stupid for how dressed up they are. Once they jump the fence, they just keep running, through the properties they see every day, over the fences they’ve jumped a million times, and in some unspoken agreement they stop at the same place, knowing where their own version of a finish line is.
There’s a nice fenced in area with a good place to tie up their horses, next to a big oak tree that always has a million violets under it at this time of year. It’s stunning at dusk. It feels good to know that they should be going to home to dinner but are instead using lead ropes to link their horses to the fence and sitting under a tree in their own universe where, even if it’s just for a while longer, it’s only the two of them.
They’re both breathless after they dismount, from both exhilaration and exhaustion, so they chuck their helmets to the ground and lay in the grass under the tree, surrounded by hundreds of purple flowers that fashion a halo around the crowns of their heads. They haven’t said a word since they took off, mostly because they’ve developed a way of communicating without actually speaking, but a little because Harry doesn’t know what to say. It’s one or ten minutes when he hears Louis sit up, sees the rustle in the grass when he rests his back against the trunk of the tree.
Harry stays put, letting the events unfold around him because he’s not in the mood to make things happen. He decides that that’s the way things are going to be now. The earth is going to make things happen and he is going to accept them, even if it burns a purple flower crown into the top of his head. He breathes in the smell of the field.
Louis is still silent even after he sits up; for a moment it had felt as if he was going to do something or say something that would change this calm air they have around one, the air that’s so full of things left unsaid that Harry is sure the universe will make its move soon.
He hears the sound of a stem being plucked with fingernails, and he waits. Louis murmurs, “Come here,” with one hand in Harry’s hair. So Harry lifts his head and puts it into Louis’ lap, knowing what’s coming next because soft moments like these have happened more than Louis likes to admit and Harry likes them more than Louis knows. They don’t speak, just wade in each other’s presence for as long as it might last, breathing as the sun sets and as Louis weaves flowers into Harry’s hair.
When they make to leave, there is a purple crown atop Harry’s head and he feels everything but royal, reminded again of that first time that Louis’ kissed him and his violets fell to the dusty ground to be only crushed with dirty riding boots. He doesn’t have the guts to shake the flowers from his head before he puts on his helmet. Crushed flowers; what a metaphor.
✿ ✿ ✿
He’s thought about it every day of his life for three years. Seventeen and longing, he let love take over his life in a way that’s omnipresent – he can escape it but never evade it. This is what he’s learned: love always comes back.
There was a time, just a month ago, when he felt his this is it moment, where everything was crashing down on him and whatever weight landed on his chest was going to make him spew words that he didn’t want to say. But Louis’ hand wasn’t holding his and there was no gold in the leaves of the trees that night. The sunset didn’t feel right. There were no flowers in his hair.
So his morning glory words wilted in the shiver of a March evening, words not strong enough to drip like the wine Louis liked to drink off of his lips and onto the roof of the barn, where they sat.
✿ ✿ ✿
When they finally get home for dinner, they only idle for an hour before slipping out again, back into Louis’ car to stay on the move. His mom had looked at him on the way out, because she’s asked him before – are you in love with him? Granted, Anne is innocent. She doesn’t know all of the other things between Harry and Louis aside from seven years’ worth of friendship. And now they’re waiting, and Louis is looking at him like he wants a kiss but Harry can’t bring himself to give one.
“We gonna go somewhere?” Harry asks. His words hold just enough bite for Louis to know he’s irritated, but not enough of an explanation. “Or are we just gonna sit here for a few hours.”
Louis just raises his eyebrows. Harry wants to hit him. He wants to slap him for making his throat constantly feel like someone’s choking him. He wants to punch his chest until he can feel his heart race the same way Harry feels it every time they even come close to each other. He wants to kick the shit out of him and kick some love into him. Harry’s mouth feels dry. “We can go wherever you want.”
Harry huffs a breath. “Just drive, asshole.”
Louis still looks unimpressed, turning the key in the ignition and drumming his fingers against the wheel. “What crawled up your ass?” You it’s you it’s always you you’re always the one who makes me feel like this.
“Fuck off.” The music starts up as the car does, and Harry reaches to turn it louder and pretends that it’s not the CD he made. Even a love song can drown out his own going through his head.
It’s a tense ride, a mood that usually doesn’t weedle its way between the two of them, so the ten minutes is excruciating. Louis fingers are drumming too fast on the wheel. Harry’s nails are making too many moons on his thighs.
When they stop, they’re back at the barn. Louis always comes back to this, and Harry doesn’t know why.
He waits for Louis to get out of the car, and he takes a minute to himself, resting his head against the back of the seat and closing his eyes for just a second. Louis appears, though. Right at his side, holding his door open like a fucking gentleman. Harry hops to the ground without even looking at him. He can’t even look at him.
“We’re not gonna ride right? It’s dark and the indoor sucks.” He’s gruff. Louis’ hand reaches out toward the small of his back and retracts.
“Of course not, idiot. Just come on the roof with me.” Idiot. What a nice what to put it. Harry is an idiot, and he and Louis both know it.
So they sit on the roof after climbing through their spot in the hay loft, and it’s quiet except for the frogs for a long while. They stay close because it’s chilly, but Harry can’t look at him. Just the golden leaves from the moonlight and the stars that are so naive for always showing themselves on clear nights. They should learn how to hide.
It’s okay until Louis starts asking questions, killing the silence that Harry had reveled in so comfortably.
“Did I break you?”
Harry doesn’t know how to answer that, so he keeps his words and folds his arms across his chest in a weak attempt to make some armor for his pale torso.
Louis tries again. “Did you want to be screwing around all these years?”
Something in Harry snaps. This is when his filter breaks, and instead of green he turns red, either with rage or love or hatred. Maybe a little bit of everything. “Of course I did. It’s not just because I thought I would lose you if we stopped. I wanted you. I still want you.”
“Did I– did you…”
Harry hates him for even having to ask.
“Did I love you when we had sex the first time?” He laughs dryly. “Of course I did,” he says again. Of course of course of course. Like everything is to be expected. This love and these years were all to been seen coming. Harry says it. “I love you now.”
“You were fifteen. I didn’t think anyone could love at fifteen. I know I couldn’t. Or at least I thought I couldn’t. You’re a long time coming, Styles.
“Well, not so much is coming now, right? Leaving, more like.” The bitterness stays in his voice. Is this how he’s going to be? Bitter and worn at seventeen.
“We have the whole summer.”
“What, to hold onto the past? Or to keep fucking so I have to pretend not to feel the way it stings whenever you touch me? Why now, Louis?”
“Because if you’re stinging, then I’m on fucking fire.”
See, this is what he’s learned: love always comes back. And the hate in his love tells him maybe he wasn’t imagining the way Louis looked at him or he wasn’t crazy when he told himself what he feels can’t be one sided or that he wouldn’t have stayed so long if he didn’t care.
“Why did you keep it like this?” Harry says. “I know you knew.”
Louis shakes his head. “I’m a dick. I’m an asshole. I’m a fucking prick, that’s why. I’m selfish, I guess. I thought it would be easier, but I think not saying I love you every time I’m near you is a little bit harder.”
Harry chokes. “A little? It’s been years since we’ve said that to each other.”
Louis looks at his feet hanging on the edge of the roof and lays his palm flat up. “And I regret every time I held back from telling you. Call me a coward. I deserve it.” Harry fits their fingers together.
He doesn’t have it in him to insult him again, not after seeing how much resentment is buried beneath his surface, but he has to ask, “Are you running away?”
“To New York?” He pauses. “I’d never want to escape you, Harry. If anything, I’d want you to come, but I do have to leave. I’m a little stuck in Maryland.”
“Stuck with me?”
“Stuck to this town,” Louis breathes. He presses their foreheads together. “I love it here. I love the energy, I love the horses, I love this barn, but it’s not letting me go. I need to go for a little while, okay?”
Harry tilts their heads a little closer, so their lips brush, but it’s fleeting. Everything’s still rushing past him in a way that’s too fast to see – like the cars on a street in New York City, maybe. “I can’t lose you before I have you.”
“I’m not stuck to you, H.” Louis squeezes his hand. “I’m with you because I want to be. I may be a few hours north, but I’m gonna make everything up to you. You’re my biggest regret, but loving you isn’t. It’s the way I treated you. I do love you, you know. And I’m going to do everything I can to make it up to you.”
A part of Harry wants to say it’s okay, but he knows it’s not. “Kiss me, please.”
It feels different, this time, because Louis knows that his head is I love you and not I want you. There are still violets in his hair, and the light from the sky is making every leaf glow golden. Their hands are touching and their lips are touching and Harry feels something tying them together. It’s desperate, but slow. It aches, but it doesn’t burn.
“I might be leaving,” Louis mutters as he pulls back, “but I am always coming back.”