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When, initially, Harry had come to Louis with a present, Louis had been hoping for something more fun than… a new smart watch.
Like, sure, he understands as one band member to another that it’s hard to buy something for the top-of-the-world band member who has everything, but a smart watch? What is he, a tech bro?
Harry, though, had very excitedly explained that they could be friends on these watches. That they can have exercise competitions and see when each other finished their workouts and such. He had motioned to his own watch (rose gold with a pink band) and talked about how excited he was to exchange stats. Like a video game, he tried to persuade Louis. You love video games, Louis.
Louis had thanked him (sincerely, because he does love presents), gotten the watch out long enough to set it up and accept Harry’s friend request, and then promptly threw it in a drawer to never think about again.
Because like, what is he? A tech bro?
—
Almost six months later, as he’s throwing things frantically into his shoulder bag because the tour bus is waiting outside of his house to pick him up for the start of the European leg of tour and he hasn’t packed anything, Louis upends said drawer into said bag. The drawer being primarily full of chargers and cables, he’s pretty sure he’s going to need most of it anyway, and Niall’s clearly gotten to the front of the bus and is laying on the horn. Well it’s not his fault he’s not packed! Usually Harry sends him like thirty reminder texts, and Louis only got ten this time!
He does about the worst packing job this world over and figures it’ll be fine because they’ve got stylists for stage so really as long as he’s got a pair of pyjamas and his phone charger he’ll be good. Then he runs out the door and onto the bus, dumping his bags just past the steps. Then he runs back to his house because he turns around and realises he forgot to shut his front door.
Finally back on the bus, as he and Niall are exiled to the back and away from where they can bug the driver, Louis stops to wonder whether he grabbed his house keys. Probably not. He’ll probably have to call a locksmith in two months when they get back. That’s okay; they know him well enough by now.
—
“I’ve dumped your bag in your bunk, Lou,” Harry says as he steps into the back lounge area of the bus. Louis’ laying across the sofa with his legs over Niall and Liam, and is already well into kicking their asses in Halo.
“Ta,” Louis says absently, lunging to beat Niall to a nicer gun in the game. “It could’ve just stayed on the floor, I wouldn’t have minded.”
“I mean, I did trip over it about six times before I ended up moving it, if that’s any consolation,” Harry says.
“It is actually, yeah.”
Louis can feel Harry rolling his eyes, even as his own are glued to the screen. “Payno did you become more shit at this in the three weeks we had off?”
“Not really,” Liam says cheerfully. “I’ve always been this bad.”
“Also, Louis,” Harry says, raising his voice over the sudden gunfire from the screen. “Here, your watch fell out of your bag. Surprised you brought it, I didn’t think you even kept it.”
He tosses it over Liam and Niall, but Louis’ eyes are still on the screen so he gets nailed in the side of the head with it.
“Cheers,” Louis says as his character goes down in a blaze of un-glory. He throws the controller down and rubs at his temple where the watch had smacked against him. “Yeah I, uh, thought it would be great for measuring exercise on stage.”
Harry’s eyes light up. “Oh you’re right,” he says. “I’m about to trounce Johnny in our competition.”
He leaves the room with an excited spring in his step as all three of them watch him go.
“You accidentally packed it, didn’t you?” Liam whispers past Niall to him.
Louis shrugs, pulling the leather watchband around his wrist. “He’s so happy,” he whispers back. “I’m not going to be the one to tell him I immediately forgot it existed.”
—
Actually, a concert ends up being a huge workout.
And Louis ends up being very addicted to winning.
Maybe he runs around on stage a little more than he normally would, and maybe he has an edge over Harry because Harry’s resting heart rate is comically slow, so his watch doesn’t always pick up what he’s doing as exercising. But either way, winning feels good and Louis is nothing if not competitive. He sends a watch to Oli too, because he can crush Oli into a fine powder at this rate, and for some reason Oli willingly accepts Louis’ challenges even though his own job handing back change at a kebab shop has him walking about twenty paces an hour.
Louis truly loves winning.
That doesn’t mean that Harry’s not good competition, though. He takes some sort of perverse joy in exercising and going on daily runs in strange cities, flanked by bodyguards (or alone in dodgy parts of towns if he’s managed to escape them). He also regularly makes use of the gyms in their fancy hotels, which once again Louis finds to be insane, especially with the amount of time they spend literally running around stage every other night.
Harry’s subtle about it, though. He sneaks away when Louis’ not paying attention, and as Louis starts challenging him in the watch app day after day after day, the more Louis ramps up the competition the more Harry willingly adds to his own workouts. It’s to the point where Louis finds himself doing burpees in the bus lounge at 11:50pm, just to make sure he ekes out a win before the time has run out.
God, what has Harry done to him?
Niall, who has been sitting on the sofa playing some sort of golf simulator, abandons his controller in favour of filming Louis.
“This is going on instagram,” he says.
“Friends only,” Louis pants. He doesn’t need the general public seeing him like this.
“Long as my finger doesn’t slip,” Niall says.
Louis kicks a leg out at him before collapsing onto the floor. His watch beeps the end of workout? beep and Louis hits the confirmation. His activity circle looks like it’s just barely passed Harry’s. Good enough.
Or, it is good enough until 11:59 when his watch goes off with another notification that Harry Styles has finished a workout.
What?
Louis watches Harry’s activity circle jump past his own. Isn’t Harry asleep?
Also, the bastard just beat him. How dare he.
Groaning, Louis climbs to his feet. His phone lights up with a notification that he’s been tagged in an instagram story, which he ignores. Instead he heads through the door to the middle of the bus, where the beds are.
“Louis!” Harry says in greeting.
“Harry!” Louis replies, equally as jaunty.
Harry’s standing in the middle of the hallway, dressed only in his running shorts (and watch), breathing hard and sweaty.
“Did you seriously just go running?” Louis asks in disbelief. They’re in a parking garage in Oslo, for Christ’s sake.
Harry shrugs. “Couldn’t let you win, could I?”
“So you got out of bed and went jogging?” Louis squeaks. This is becoming ridiculous.
“I’m going to grab a shower,” Harry says, pulling rumpled clothes out of his bunk. He smiles at Louis. “You’re welcome to join me.”
Louis stammers out a not on your life, because he probably just wants Louis to get his watch wet and ruined or something (in the back of his mind there’s something about the watch being water resistant and useful for swimming but that’s beside the point).
Harry shrugs. “Suit yourself,” he says, and sidles past Louis, wafting that sweaty boy smell onto him.
Louis’ watch informs him that he’s lost the day’s competition.
He immediately hits the button to challenge Harry for the new day.
—
Louis has never slept so hard in his life as he has on this tour.
His body is also becoming very toned. He knows he’s always looked good in sleeveless shirts, but this is getting ridiculous.
“Mate, you’re putting the rest of us to shame,” Liam whines when he comes into the lounge to see Louis doing pull-ups on the bar he asked Paul to install.
“Listen,” Louis bites out, dropping down onto the floor. “I can’t stop, he keeps winning.”
“Have you considered that Harry’s just fucking with you at this point?” Liam asks.
Louis has considered it. It’s incredible. Harry’s exercise routine has always been long and varied, but he’s beating Louis primarily because he just keeps adding more tiny workouts, between all of their activities. Planned studio time at three? He’ll get a workout in for the ten minutes before. Getting to the new arena at six? He’ll disappear on the bus at 5:45 and emerge looking freshly sweaty at 5:59.
That’s the real mystery, honestly. Louis can’t even find him half the time.
He’s hidden out at the front with the driver to make sure Harry isn’t, like, attaching the watch to a piece of machinery and cheating. Or like, giving it to someone else. But whatever Harry’s doing, he’s clearly alone.
Maybe he’s tunnelled down to where the luggage is kept below the bus and is doing sit-ups down there.
They’re tied dead even in the competition. Every time Louis gets a win, Harry immediately one-ups him the next day. It’s like he’s taunting Louis, with his smug face and his smirky smug smile and his smirky smug dimply dimples. It’s fucking ridiculous and Louis’ going to go absolutely insane.
Well, but with the exception of this competition, his mental health is doing decently well. It’s likely all the exercise. That’s also something Louis can be bitter about.
“What’s he doing?” Louis asks Niall, cornering him by the breakfast display.
“Eating breakfast?” Niall hazards, looking over at Harry sitting at the far end of the table devouring a bowl of bananas and muesli.
“No, Niall, you know what I mean,” Louis says, grabbing a bunch of grapes and shaking them threateningly at him. A few fall off and bounce to the floor.
“Sarah’s not going to be happy about that,” Niall says.
Louis growls at him.
“Alright, alright,” Niall throws his hands up. “Look, you two are too much and also no one has ever bought me a smart watch so I feel very left out.” He grabs two slices of brown bread and pops them in the toaster. “All I’m saying is you have to figure out where he’s going to exercise and I think you’ll get it.”
Louis gives him a flat look, and then slurps up two of the grapes from the bunch straight into his mouth. He’s been trying to do that for weeks. Thanks for nothing, Niall.
He walks over to the table and Harry motions excitedly at the free spot next to him.
Louis slumps down into it.
Harry beams.
Louis sends him a new challenge on his watch.
—
Another week goes by. Louis loses four competitions and wins three.
He’s just brushed his teeth, and spit toothpaste out the window (the bus was moving at the time because they’re on their way to Belgium; it’s splattered all down the outside now).
It’s just before midnight but pretty much everyone’s already asleep, because it’s been an exhausting week of almost daily concerts and meet and greets. When Louis walks into the bunk room, he expects to be the only one awake.
And he thinks that he is, until his watch goes off to tell him that Harry’s just completed a workout.
It really says something about Louis’ desperation that he’s still wearing the watch as he goes to bed, just for those last few minutes of activity.
Louis, upset that this means the competition that he was so sure he was going to win has been flipped once again, stomps over to Harry’s bunk and rips the curtain open. He has some sort of vague idea in his mind about lying in Harry’s bunk so that when Harry returns from his secret workout space, he’ll open the curtain and Louis will have a dramatic reveal moment and get to confront him.
That vague idea is missing a few key points, though.
Like the fact that Harry is actively in his bunk right at this moment.
He is sweaty.
He also looks like he’s just barely managed to pull running shorts over his otherwise bare ass before Louis tore the curtain open.
Suddenly Louis is connecting a lot of dots.
“You prick,” Louis hisses at him (Niall and Liam are, presumably, asleep). “You’ve been cheating.”
“I have not,” Harry argues back, face flushed.
“This isn’t exercise!” Louis’ whisper turns into a squeak.
“Gets your heart rate up, doesn’t it?” Harry asks, looking both embarrassed and smug. “You could’ve been doing the same.”
“I thought you were out running!”
Harry pulls a face. “We’re going over a hundred kilometres per hour,” he points out. “I think I’d get left behind.”
Louis growls. “I meant in general,” he emphasises.
“Well I should point out I never labelled these workouts in the watch,” Harry says. “Anyway, I don’t regret it and I won fair and square.”
“You’ve been getting off and counting it for exercise!” Louis squeaks.
“And if I get you off I’ll keep the watch on, too!” Harry whispers back. His voice is too deep for proper whispering.
Louis puts his hands over his face. “Now is not the time for sweet talking,” he says.
“It is if it gets you to finally share a bunk with me,” says Harry.
“Spunk bunk,” argues Louis.
“It can be your bunk, I don’t mind.”
Louis scrunches up his nose. “No.” He says. “I mean. Yes. But you have to shower first.”
“Gladly,” Harry says, immediately jumping up to do so and promptly knocking his head on the ceiling of his bunk.
“Oh my god shut up,” Niall groans from his bunk.
“And no sex on the bus,” Liam shouts.
Louis lets Harry pass him to run for the shower. He wonders which of them would clock more exercise if they kept their watches on while they do it.
Because Harry asked him out basically sort of, right?
Well, that doesn’t mean Louis isn’t going to beat him in their competitions.
It just means the more stamina gets the better score. Like the opposite of Mario Kart.
He climbs into his own bunk and clears enough space for Harry. Perfect. He’ll get the man of his dreams and win the competition.