Chapter Text
To say Louis was effected by the No Control Project would be an understatement. It was evident in the way he took to thanking everyone on Twitter and how often he brought it up during interviews. Not to mention that it came at a very important time in his and, well, the rest of One Direction’s life. With Zayn leaving the band, infamous Twitter feuds (with Naughty Boy and Zayn), it was a shaky transitioning period for One Direction.
Not only were they going to be changing their sound again – kind of inevitable with one whole person down – they were also getting ready to switch management labels. Yes, finally after almost five years with the god awful Modest! Management, One Direction were finally going to be able to gain a little bit more control over their careers.
It had been a long time coming, even the heads of Modest! themselves, know that their biggest act will be dropping them come the thirty-first of May. Which, is probably why they aren’t putting up much of a fight in terms of undoing a lot of Modest!’s own mistakes – well, at least according to the boys themselves. Starting of course with none other than Louis’ long-term beard.
Eleanor definitely had to go. And since her contract was going to end in the middle of March anyway, Modest! as well as the members of One Direction saw no need to extend it. So, with a little too much of a smirk, Louis kicked her out the door. After that, there was talk of Harry and Louis coming out together of course, but that was shot down almost immediately by the homophobes at Modest!
That was only a small set back though. Instead of sulking over the predictable answer, Louis took to the clubs instead. Sure, the first time he thought of venturing his way to the front step of a local bar was to get back at Modest! for not letting him and Harry come out, but after that first night, he realised just how much he missed it.
In the beginning of One Direction’s days, Louis was always the partier of the group. He loves the attention on him, loves being under all of the lights. He loves losing all of his crazy thoughts and stress in the form of dancing, loves taking shot after shot with whomever is around. That phase soon faded out though when he started dating Harry.
It’s not that Harry forced him to, it was quite the opposite really. Harry didn’t want to be the reason that Louis couldn’t go out and do the fun things he enjoyed. However, with his curly locks and green eyes, Louis began redefining his definition on the word fun. Sure, he still liked to throw back some with Niall every now and again, but there was something enticing about staying up just talking to Harry, too.
Louis got to know how loving Harry was during that time. Of course he always knew just how gentle the lad was. It’s not like he was immune to his charm in the X-Factor house, but spending three or four hours after every concert talking to him was a bit different. He learned about his penchant for weird accessories – which quickly led to the scarf headband purchases Louis made every chance he got, only to give to Harry the first chance he got. He learned about Harry’s relationship with his mother and sister. He learned about how Harry wanted a family at some point in his life as well. He learned how Harry carefully chose every word that he spoke of, enunciating them each with the amount of fineness they deserved. And he especially learned just how terrible he was at making jokes. It was only later that Louis began to learn the more intimate details of Harry’s.
Louis remembers very little from school, as he wasn’t the most studious of his peers, but he does remember lovely quotes his literature teacher swore by. One of his favourites was by Ingrid Bergmun, “A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous.” Louis never knew how true those words were until about halfway through their first tour, when it seemed Louis had learned everything there was to know about Harry at the time. It took him a minute to conjure up the quote in his head, and all but a second to act upon it.
From there, their physical relationship increased tenfold. First kissing, then snogging, which naturally lead to the occasional hand job. It seemed like it had been only a couple of months before Harry was going down on Louis. Though a bit surprised by Harry’s forthrightness at first, Louis didn’t hesitate to return the favour minutes later.
Since then, Harry and Louis had a pretty healthy sex life. They had the occasional row with each other, sometimes leading to the refrainment of sex for days, but nothing long enough to leave them in a real dry spell. It was hard for both of them to live without the other. Having to see them almost twenty four-seven and avoid talking to them at all costs can only go so far.
Either way, with or without sex, Louis quickly learned that it was better to be as close to Harry as possible, even if they weren’t exactly on speaking terms. As a result, Louis had all but forgotten about going out to a club. Something that the heads of Modest! were thrilled about when they had first brought up mentions of Eleanor. After all, how bad would it have looked if he was supposedly dating someone and hitting up the bars every other night.
Now that she was out of the picture though, and not able to have Harry by his side publically quite yet, the idea of going to the club seemed exciting once more. Modest! wasn’t too angry about it either. Logically, if he was getting out of a long-term relationship, he would be living it up again right afterwards. It was only for a couple of months though.
After Louis had his few weeks of fun with Liam, Niall and Zayn, he knew he would happily go back to Harry’s side again. At the end of the day, he can remember those long nights in the beginning with Harry. Three years later, and those nights still beat anything else he could be doing.
Of course, the idea of those crazy nights with Liam, Niall and Zayn quickly turned to just Liam and Niall. It was the end of March, just a week after his split with Eleanor, that Zayn told them he was leaving the band. Though not entirely surprising to anyone who saw Zayn every day, it was a bit surprising that he couldn’t wait until their contract was up until the end of May to officially leave the band.
Louis isn’t sure what officially pushed him to do it. Was it the rumours about him cheating on his fiancé? Was it just the fact that Zayn hated being in the limelight? Was it the pressure he was getting from his new producer Naughty Boy? It’s been two months and Louis still isn’t really sure what was the last straw for Zayn. Naturally, it lead to many arguments – some in the public eye, but most behind closed doors – between the two of them. It wasn’t until Naughty Boy made fun of his vocals and Zayn just sat back and watched that Louis began to completely hate Zayn.
Forget all that shit about ‘brothers for life.’ Zayn knew how much Louis was insecure about his voice. Zayn has been at the end of many crying sessions where Louis scrolls through his mentions on Twitter. He witnessed first had how little he sung during X-Factor and the first few albums of theirs. To just sit by and let some outsider critisise him like that was unforgiveable in Louis’ mind.
Which, is why Project No Control, as the fans have so cleverly dubbed it, is so important to him. Not only is it uniting the fan group after the whole Zayn debacle, it’s the fans’ way of supporting Louis and the remaining members of One Direction. Louis has been online, has read the articles in which some fans have been quoted saying how “No Control” was picked as the single because it featured Louis’ voice and that they just want him to know they love his voice. He understands that it is a way to unify they group. He also loves how it is a big Fuck You to their management label and Louis could not be more proud.
It’s why he has taken to thanking them as many times as possible – well, as much as he can while still keeping up his snarky image. The members of One Direction are constantly thanking their fans. Louis know this, he was trained to do that. Though sometimes even Louis finds the loss of sincerity in his words from having to use it over and over again, he has meant every single word that he has said about Project No Control.
A fact that had become evident during the Billboard Music Awards when Louis couldn’t help but bring it up again during the post-show interview. It’s not like he had to, the question wasn’t even necessarily about “No Control,” but Louis can’t help but to bring it up as many times as he can. For once, he is able to look online and see that they are reaching a larger audience. People are finally starting to realise they aren’t just the five quirky lads that had that “What Makes You Beautiful” hit.
Even now, the night before they are switching management companies, “No Control” is still being played on the radio everywhere. Tomorrow, Harry and Louis were officially set to come out and Louis was still buzzing about “No Control.” He feels like he did back when their first single came out. He remembers screaming at the top of his lungs every time “What Makes You Beautiful” came on the radio, and that wasn’t even a good song! Louis is finally getting his three year wish coming true, and the only thing he can think to do is sing along to his part in “No Control” as it comes on the radio yet again.
Harry can only look on fondly though. He knows how much this means to Louis. He can see just how much it has effected Louis even by looking at his physical appearance. He isn’t as tired looking all of the time, is more likely to be smiling when you look his way, and he hasn’t mentioned Zayn once in the past week. Which is why, he was planning a huge surprise for Louis tomorrow.
See, Louis knew that something was going to happen during their show. They had been planning out just how to come out during the past few months. It was Harry who had suggested making some type of speech during their first concert back after their two month break. Though it was pushed to the side at first, it seemed people kept coming back to it during their early discussions of it. After a week of that, it was officially picked as the best way to come out. It was more personal than a press release, but would quickly spread thanks to the thousands of people who would be attending the concert and the use of social media.
They had gone over the plan countless amounts of times by now. Each member knew their job during the time Harry first began speaking. They knew where they needed to be on stage, where to look, what was going to be said. Everything had to be perfect and clear to make sure there was a good shot somewhere. Of course they had professional recording set to take place, but they knew fans would be the first at getting the news out. So of course, Harry decided he was going to throw all of those careful plans away.
Seeing how excited and happy Louis was in these past couple of weeks really got Harry thinking. Though Harry knew Louis would never forget about this point in his life, he wanted to make absolute sure of it. So, Harry went out and did something a little stupid. He knew he was going to get chewed out by it a bit from their new management label, but the fact of the matter is that they were going to come out anyways, why not do it with a big bang?