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"Harry, no."
He pouts.
"Harry," Louis sighs, "Babe please."
Harry pouts even more before saying, "But Lou. A cat."
And yes a cat.
For almost a week now Louis and Harry have been debating whether a cat or a dog is a good animal for their first pet together because as Harry put it, "It's super important Louis! How well we care for them will determine how good we are at being parents!"
(Which Louis would disagree with since a cat and a baby human are two very different things but Harry is Harry and Louis loves him.)
"Harry, love, why won't we get a dog? They're so much more playful." Louis tries, they've been going at it for a while and frankly Louis has almost given up.
"Alright."
"Lovely c'mon-" Louis cuts himself off, "Wait seriously? Just like that?"
Harry shrugs, "Yeah, why not? We can go look at some today and if we see a dog we like we'll take it from there?"
Louis narrows his eyes at the boy. That was too easy, given he was pouting just a minute ago. Something isn't right here.
Harry stares at Louis with wide innocent eyes.
"What's the matter Lou? Didn't you want a dog?"
Louis hums, "I don't know anymore." He watches as Harry stands from where he sits across from him and sets himself in Louis' lap, draping his arms loosely around his neck.
"Can I have a kiss?" Harry asks looking down at his boyfriend. Louis tilts his head up meeting Harry in the middle.
Louis hums into his boy's mouth, and wraps his arms around Harry's waist. They kiss slow and sweet with Harry's hands resting on Louis' shoulders. The younger boy nips at his boyfriends lip before grinding down in his lap. Louis grunts and pulls Harry closer.
Louis licks into his mouth and kisses down his jaw to his neck. Harry whimpers as he begins to suck a mark right beneath his ear. He feels hands tug at his hair, and is pulled back into a frantic kiss. He pulls away suddenly and rests his forehead against Harry's, breathing heavily.
Harry kisses the corner or Louis' lips. He smooths his hands over Louis' shoulders to his chest and back.
"Are you trying to seduce me into getting you a cat?"
"Is it working?"
Louis doesn't want to admit that it almost did.
"No."
Harry sighs again and slumps against Louis in defeat. Louis chuckles and puts his hand into curly hair scratching lightly.
"C'mon babes. Up. Let's go."
-
"Louis! Look at this one!"
Harry seems to have perked up significantly now that they're at the pet shop because as he walks over the green-eyed boy is holding a small white kitten with frosty blue eyes up to his face.
"Yeah, s'cute Haz." Louis hums and brings a hand up to scratch at its small head.
Harry holds it up to Louis' face next, "Aw look you're both so cute!"
The boy's eyes suddenly brighten as he seems to get an idea.
"Lou, here." he dumps the cat into Louis' hands and Louis holds the kitten awkwardly not knowing what to do with it.
Louis looks at it confusedly. It's cute now, but what about later when it's not a cute kitten anymore and tearing up their couches?
"Babe hold him up! Look at me!" Harry says now holding his phone up.
Louis crosses his eyes and sticks out his tongue, smiling goofily at the camera.
He laughs when he see's Harry's pout.
"Why can't you ever take a normal picture?"
Louis puts the kitten back down and kisses Harry's cheek. Harry posts the picture to Instagram, captioned, blue eyed beauties.
Louis snorts and smacks Harry's bum before walking away towards some fish, calling over his shoulder.
~
They look around more. They see more kittens some fish and even consider a turtle, but everything stops when Harry sees a little duckling. He almost trips over his feet in his rush to reach the little yellow duckling.
One of the employee's is already holding the duckling and talking to someone else.
Harry stops and stands a couple of feet away watching the duckling with wide eyes. The picture of a patient boy waiting his turn. Louis comes over and rests his hand on the small of the taller boy's back.
"Harold, we can't get a duck." Louis says shaking his head.
Harry looks over at him with wide eyes, and no. There's no absolute way. The younger boy is currently looking at him with a challenging look, determination in his eyes. Louis has to be strong they've gotten this far.
The employee, he now knows is called Sarah from her name tag, takes the duckling back and notices a patiently waiting Harry. She smiles over at him and Harry walks forward asking politely if he can hold the little animal.
She places the duckling into Harry's large hands and he brings it up to his face cooing under his breath.
Louis smiles fondly at the two until a voice breaks him out of his trance.
"You're shopping for a pet together?"
Louis looks over at Sarah who has moved towards him, "Um, yeah. He's convinced we need to practice with an animal before we take on real babies."
Him and Sarah chuckle and watch as Harry coo's over the duck some more, dimpling adorably, may he add.
"May I recommend a dog then? They're a bit more of a family pet." Sarah tries.
He sighs, "Trust me when I say I've tried."
Harry steps over to Louis and puts the duck in Louis' face. His blue eyes set on a small and yellow duck near his nose that smells faintly of baby powder.
Harry awe's loudly, "This is even cuter than the cat!"
He watches as his boy kneels and sets it down, watching as it waddles and quacks weakly.
Sarah speaks up from next to him, "Someone brought her in a couple of days ago, we just want to give her to someone who will promise to give her a good home and not eat her."
Harry who is currently sat keeping the duckling from waddling too far away. Looks up with a scandalous look on his face.
"We'd never eat her!"
Louis chuckles quietly and agrees. He crouches and watches her waddle over to him and bite at his shoelace. He pets her head with his finger gently. He hears the click of a photo being taken and shakes his head at his boyfriend who looks near tears.
Harry's tapping away at his phone quickly, hissing under his breath, "So cute."
Sarah waits a beat before giving more information about ducklings and duck care and their rapid growth.
Louis looks over to Harry and is met with wide eyes and a small pout.
"Harry no, and you know why."
-
They go home with a pet duck.
"Olivia." Harry declares in the car on the ride home. He's holding the little box their new pet is currently in.
A weak quack sounds from the box.
"She likes it! Lou, she likes it! Olivia?"
Another quack.
Louis looks incredulously at the box.
"Olivia?" He tries.
They wait for the quack.
There's no quack.
Harry smirks and sings, "Olivia?"
Olivia quacks.
Louis is appalled. Never has he been so offended, by a duck no less.
He fish mouths, at a loss for words. Not knowing what to say to this duck who clearly doesn't like him. He hears Harry laughing loudly.
"Aw babe, maybe you just need to cuddle her?" He says in between chuckles.
Louis grumbles the rest of the way home. They didn't even go anywhere near the puppies.
~
They go home and they have a duck.
Harry posts a picture on Instagram of the animal in their home and they immediately receive an excited text from Niall demanding to know when he can come over.
The rest of the day is spent with Harry cooing over her and taking pictures of her and Louis constantly fonding over the both them.
Louis' gotten over the dog thing but how can he not when he has a cute boyfriend being cute with a cute, little, fluffy duck?
-
Louis is woken up to the sounds of small quacks and curly hair up his nose. He tightens his arms around his boyfriend's waist and groans.
It's very early and Louis' very tired. He and Harry had a very late night, if you catch his drift, and Olivia's quacks are the last thing he wants to hear right now. It's been a few days since they've had her and she never fails to wake them up with her quacking and this morning is no different.
Harry stirs in his arms and blindly reaches out over the bed and scoops Olivia up. He turns in Louis' arms so they're facing each other and he places the duck right in between them.
Louis slowly cracks open his eyes, his hair mussed with sleep.
They're cuddling naked with a duck.
"Harry-" Louis starts.
"Shhh." Harry puts a finger against Louis' lips hushing him, and okay.
Harry falls asleep promptly and so does Olivia and Louis, well Louis is just confused and quite endeared, but he falls asleep anyway.
~
He wakes up again later on and slips out of the bed quietly away from the duckling and Harry to go pee.
He relieves himself and looks in the mirror and brushes his teeth he stares at his messy reflection. He eyes the love bites littered across his chest and smirks. He turns around to look at his back and sees long red scratches down his back, remnants of last night. He chuckles and walks back into their room.
He stands in the doorway of their room and sees Harry watching Olivia patter and stumble on their bed, occasionally using his hand to keep her from falling over the sides.
He watches them and how the light streams in from the windows. He hears Harry coo at the yellow fluff ball and watches him kiss her head.
Louis walks over to the pair and sits on the bed next to the boy He wraps an arm around his shoulder and nuzzles into the side of Harry's face.
Harry giggles at the ticklish feeling of the man's light beard and Louis tilts the the younger boy's chin toward's himself, kissing him deeply.
Harry pulls away sheepishly, "Lou, 've got mornin' breath." he says huskily.
"Doesn't matter," Louis mumbles in response and goes to kiss him again, "I love you" He says into his lips.
They kiss slow and languid like the morning and just enjoy each other. Louis sucks softly and kisses a love bite he left last night. Harry tilts his head back and puts a hand on the older boys thigh.
Harry gasps.
"Louis! You're naked!"
He pulls back to see a wide-eyed Harry holding Olivia, shielding her eyes from Louis with large hands.
"Yeah, so are you?"
Louis' really confused did Harry forget everything that happened last night? Did Louis really fuck him that hard, that he forgot they even fucked?
"You can't be naked in front of her!"
Her?
Oh.
"The duck." Louis says disbelieving.
Harry nods his head quickly.
"Our kinda-daughter. Louis. Our daughter can't see us naked." Harry continues like he's desperately trying to get Louis to understand.
Louis covers himself with his hands and looks to the boy for approval. Harry only raises an eyebrow in response.
He sighs and looks around for his boxers. He puts them on and looks back at Harry to see him whispering and cooing to the duck cradled in his hands
Louis only shakes his head fondly at his very ridiculous partner.
-
About a week into owning a pet duck Louis notices that the duckling has like, imprinted on Harry or something. She follows him everywhere he goes and if she isn't near him she quacks softly until Harry is in her eyesight again.
And like, Harry always told Louis about how he wishes he could get pregnant and how he was convinced he had maternal instincts. Harry was just very motherly by nature.
But a mother duck?
(It's another morning when Louis wakes up before Harry, he decides to make breakfast. He crawls out from underneath Harry passing Olivia who is sleeping in her bed, that's by the bathroom door in the shape of a duck, that Harry insisted they bought, and downstairs into the kitchen.
Louis scratches his stomach and sets to making breakfast. Just as he finishes the last of the pancake batter he hears the thuds of Harry's footsteps and his boyfriend stumbles into the kitchen rubbing his eyes and sure enough there is a little yellow duckling following after him.
Louis smiles fondly, "Morning babes."
Harry hums low and wraps his arms loosely around Louis' neck and nuzzles his head into his neck.
"Mornin'" He mumbles low, voice scratchy.
Louis kisses Harry's head and he feels something fuzzy peck at his toes and when Harry eats his breakfast and at the table Olivia sits at his feet until he's finished, waiting patiently for his attention.)
Louis will admit that he does get a lot of adorable pictures, that he of course posts on Instagram. He's pretty sure anyone who follows him is tired of seeing them almost everyday. Not that his Instagram didn't already consist of purely Harry (because it definitely did), but now it consists of Harry and a very cute duckling.
He once had come home from work after a late night and walked into the dark living room lit only from the light of the TV playing in the background.
Louis had moved closer to find Harry wrapped up in his large lilac sweater with Olivia resting on his chest as they both slept. The rise and fall of Harry's chest moving the little ball of fluff.
He had taken about a million pictures.
-
Niall's meant to come over later on to hang out with him. Harry went out earlier to see some old friends and won't be back for a while longer.
It's just him and Olivia right now and he's pretty bored. She was cute and fun for about an hour after Harry left but he's starting to think maybe she was only cute because Harry was around.
He misses Harry.
His other half.
His soulmate.
He will admit, they are slightly co-dependent, but Louis will argue they know how to function like regular people without each other.
The blue-eyed boy has been sitting on the couch nursing his second beer watching some game show he doesn't remember the name of for a while now and Olivia has decided to seat herself next to his thigh (something she rarely does because she avoids him like he has the plague.)
There's a knock at the door that has Louis yipping happily at the idea of there being another human being to interact with.
He opens the door and a flurry of blond hair rushes past him and into his home.
"Olivia," Niall shout's out, "You're so cute!"
Louis sighs and closes the door. He walks dejectedly back over to his spot on the couch with his warm beer while Niall lays on the ground cooing at the yellow duckling.
Louis thinks that even if they had gotten a dog this situation wouldn't be much different
-
Louis will argue that despite it seeming he doesn't care at all for Olivia, he does. In a weird way she's become a part of their family.
Even if she's growing extremely quickly and its starting to get a bit impractical to have a pet duck.
Which is why after having Olivia for about a month they've decided it would be best to send her off with Harry's mum where she'll thrive on open fields instead of in their flat.
Louis counts it all as a success when they both only get a little sniffly when she goes to join the other ducks.
They'll get a dog probably. They'll stick around for much longer. Hell, maybe even cat.
While they're at it, why not a baby?