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Louis is the type of person to get easily distracted, which Liam should’ve kept in mind when he asked Louis to grab him a coffee on the way back home. 2 hours ago, that little shit.
Louis is in the middle of charming the lad working a hotdog stand for a free hotdog (while making many sexual innuendos using hotdogs, which Louis thinks deserves an award), when he gets a call from Liam.
“Now, before you yell at me…”
“Fucking hell, Louis, it’s not that hard to get coffee.”
“Oh, don’t get your panties in a bunch. I’m in line right now.” Louis mouths a ‘goodbye’ to the mediocre looking hotdog boy before venturing across the street to the nearest Starbucks.
“Liar,” Liam mutters before hanging up, and Louis makes plans to scold him for not saying a proper ‘Bye, I love you’.
Louis shoves his phone in his coat pocket and notes that Liam also owes him a hot dog as he wanders behind some chick in line who is wearing far too much of ‘Eau De Hooker’. He practically barfs when he hears her try to get at the poor barista with, “You’re kind of cute… maybe I can pay you in a different way…” Like, Jesus Christ, this isn’t a porno shoot.
After Eau De Hooker scampers off, Louis steps up (after sending a well-deserved eye roll her direction, of course) and puts on a smile for the barista. And shit, maybe now Louis can see where she’s coming from.
“Hey,” Barista Boy greets with a dimply smile and sparkling gleam in his eyes. He’s wearing a gaudy blinking heart button on his apron, and Louis almost forgets what day it is. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”
“Hi, you too!” Louis unintentionally chokes out, biting down on his tongue with all his might for sounding like a giddy middle-school girl. He distracts himself by reading over the menu, but his eyes fly towards the name tag on Barista Boy, which reads Harry. “I’ll take a large coffee, Harry.”
Harry looks like the sun is about to burst out of his ass as he pushes some buttons on the cash register. “No sugar, I’m assuming?”
“Wha- well, yeah. How’d you know?”
“Because if you have any more sweetness, you’ll become a diabetic.” Harry shoots a wink at Louis and Louis starts to feel a little queasy. A cute guy with dimples and lame pick-up lines. He’s met his soul mate.
“Nice pick-up line. Where’d you get it, secondary school?” Louis sneers, figuring that playing hard to get wouldn’t be so bad.
“No, but that comeback definitely is from primary school.”
Motherfuck, Louis is definitely a goner now and it takes all that’s in him to not blurt out ‘I love you, marry me’ right then and there.
“Touché.” Louis grins. “I’ll still take that coffee, though.”
“I hope you don’t mind waiting, then.”
“Why would I have to wait?”
“My break isn’t for another hour.” And Harry starts to do that gleaming-sun-coming-from-ass thing again.
“God, well aren’t you a charmer,” Louis says with an attempted sarcastic tone, but there’s so much truth behind it that it’s impossible.
“No, I’m Harry.”
Louis slaps his hands over his face to avoid Harry’s expression (and conceal his own threatening smile), but can practically feel his shit-eating grin burning through his fingers.
“You’re cute when you blush,” Harry adds nonchalantly as he presses some more irrelevant buttons on the register. “Can I get your name?”
“That’s an awfully dull pick-up line,” Louis comments, sweeping his fringe aside and shoving his hands back into his coat pockets.
“Don’t flatter yourself; I need it for your coffee.” Harry tilts his head towards the cup and marker in his hands, and if Louis didn’t feel like a complete knob before, he does now.
“Yeah, right,” he stammers. “Louis. L-O-U-I-S. I’ll have your balls if you spell it wrong.”
“That doesn’t sound that bad, to be honest,” Harry smirks while keeping his eyes on the cup, and Louis really wants to jump over the counter and take control of this guy.
“How much?” he asks, keeping his mind off of anything that has to do with having Harry’s balls.
“On the house,” Harry replies with a charming smirk, turning back to brew a cup.
Louis pauses for a moment to make sure he’s not stuck in some gaudy romance movie, but then shakes his head and steps aside.
“Y’know, the lady in front of me seemed pretty into you. You should’ve tried flirting with her instead.”
“Yeah, but she hasn’t got an arse like yours.”
“Should’ve seen that coming…” Louis nods to himself, flashing his eyes up at Harry once before nodding again and stepping aside to wait for Liam’s coffee. It’s during the wait when he realizes how incredibly sad his life is. He’s spending the morning of Valentine’s Day getting coffee for his stupid flat mate who can’t say a proper “Bye, I love you” and flirting with a barista, who probably flirts with old buggers like Louis just so they don’t feel too bad about themselves.
Yeah, so this day kinda sucks.
“Louis.”
His eyes snap from its gaze back up to Harry, who is holding a large coffee cup with a stupid half-smirk.
“Right, yeah.” Louis walks up to retrieve the drink, accidentally brushing fingers with Harry. “Thank you, Harry. Happy Valentine’s Day.”
“You too,” Harry says back, cautiously checking back behind him once before hopping over the counter and pushing his curly mess of hair aside. “What are you doing tonight?”
Louis raises an eyebrow and thinks this out for a minute. He could either:
- Say “Nothing” and probably end up making plans with Harry.
or
- Lie and say he’s already got plans so that he doesn’t seem like a total desperate loner.
“I’ve already got plans,” he finally blurts out, sharing a disappointed look with Harry.
“Right,” Harry says quickly. “Thought so.”
“What d’ya mean by that?”
Harry shrugs meekly and keeps himself occupied by straightening up some nearby table. “You just don’t seem like the type to be alone on Valentine’s Day.”
Louis lets out a shaky breath and shrugs because that’s exactly his type. “Yeah, well.”
The two lock eyes for a moment and Louis is practically biting his lip off to avoid saying anything stupid. “Thanks, again.”
“No problem.” Harry does a weird bow/nod kind of thing and smiles again. “Happy Valentine’s Day, Louis.”
“You too.”
++
“Honey, I’m home!”
Liam pokes his head up from the couch and scoffs. “S’been hours, Lou. I don’t even want coffee anymore.”
“Well, good. I drank it on the way here.”
“Fuck you.”
Louis smiles and throws the empty cup into the trash bin (and misses), sighing and lugging himself to sit on Liam’s legs.
“I met a boy,” Louis sighs happily, and he would feel utterly pathetic if he said this on any other day. But, alas, today is Valentine’s Day, which is basically a free-pass to being a complete sop.
“Looking doesn’t count as meeting.”
“I know that, tit.” Louis smacks Liam’s belly and rolls his eyes. “His name’s Harry and he’s perfect.”
“Forget him, I found the perfect date for you tonight.”
Louis groans loudly and shakes his head because he’s definitely not going out tonight. “I’ve told you before, blind dates are stupid.”
“But think about it,” Liam proposes, sitting up and gesturing his hands around like he’s actually got a good plan. “Me, Zayn, Thomas, and you all together for a casual Valentine’s Day dinner date. Me and Zayn can get closer, and you can finally stop whining about being alone all the time. It’d be brilliant.”
“What the fuck kind of name is Thomas, anyways,” Louis murmurs, rolling his eyes again. “Sounds like one of my grandpa’s friends.”
Louis listens to Liam ramble for the next few minutes about how childish he’s being and how he should just suck it up and go for the sake of not being a bitter asshole.
“So, yeah?” Liam finally ends with, looking up with a hopeful puppy dog look (which Louis find absolutely nauseating, if he’s being honest).
“Dammit, fine.” Louis watches in horror as Liam literally squeals and kisses Louis’ cheek sloppily.
“Thank you, Lou, thank you thank you thank you.”
“You’re not cute,” Louis mumbles, scowling at a pouty Liam and lying across his chest.
“They’re picking us up at 6, so make sure you’re ready by then,” Liam warns, and smiles widely when Louis frowns bitterly. “You’re the best.”
“I hate your guts.”
++
It turns out Thomas isn’t an old man at all. He’s actually not that bad looking. In fact, he’s kind of a model. He’s got beach blonde hair and hazel eyes, and he reminds Louis of a Malibu Ken doll.
Basically, Louis is pleasantly surprised and he figures that tonight won’t be too miserable.
He takes a seat next to Thomas and takes a whiff of his cologne, which is either Hollister or Abercrombie (Louis is good at this stuff, ok?).
“So, Thomas,” Louis chirps up because he’s a social motherfucker. “Tell me about yourself.”
“Right, ok,” Thomas says, and his voice is rapid and has some Californian accent, Louis thinks. “I’m Thomas. I’m 22 years old, originally from San Diego…”
Louis mentally pats his own back for being so spot on.
“I work at Hollister…”
Fuck, Louis is really good at this.
“I’m a floor model, but I recently got signed with this big agency, which is why I moved here in London.”
“He’s a model with Zayn,” Liam swoons, and Louis rolls his eyes slow enough to get his point across. Not a day goes by when Liam doesn’t brag about his model boyfriend, the little twat.
“Yeah, it’s no big deal,” Thomas shrugs in an attempt to seem humble. It’s not working so well considering he’s literally pouting or doing some weird model pose thing, and it takes everything in Louis not to burst out laughing.
“Ah, you’re so modest,” Louis breathes, biting his cheeks to hold in his threatening smile.
“I actually get that a lot.” Thomas shrugs and does a smile/pout sort of thing, and everything about this guy is so ridiculous that Louis literally can’t handle it.
“I’m gonna go to the bathroom.” Louis forces himself to avoid eye contact as he journeys to the bathroom, which is luckily only two tables away from his table.
Once he enters the ugly sea foam room, he feels like he can finally breathe (although it smells like piss and old lady soap). He takes a deep breath and situates himself so that he’s sitting criss-cross applesauce on the sink counter, thinking about how sucky his love life has been.
First there was Stan, who really was just an experiment. It lasted about two hand jobs until they both realized how wrong they were together.
Then there was Eleanor, who was more of a challenge than an experiment. Either way, it never got any farther than a gross make out session.
Recently there was Nick, which Louis doesn’t even want to think about, honestly.
He sighs and pulls his phone out, starting up a game of Fruit Ninja and deciding self-pity would be a lot better if he had a game to go along with it. He hums along to some Michael Buble song that’s playing in the background as he enters his 5th round. That’s when he hears a voice singing along lowly, which literally causes him to jump off the counter and yelp.
“Jesus,” Louis breathes, looking up to see none other than Barista Boy.
“Louis!”
“What are you doing here?”
“I like the urinals.”
Louis tilts his head back and groans. “No, why are you here, here?” he asks, because if he’s on a date, he’ll probably just claw his own face off.
“Oh,” Harry nods, approaching the sink to wash his (insanely large) hands. “I’m on a date.”
Disappointment washes over Louis’ face, although it isn’t much of a surprise to him.
“Great, me too!” Louis says, doing an awkwardly placed bow/salute before slipping out the door and rushing to his table. It’s not until he sits down when he realizes how much better that could’ve ended.
“Hey,” Thomas welcomes, flashing a toothy smile that’s almost too white. “How was the bathroom, Hugh?”
Hugh? Did he just fucking call me Hugh?
“Great, just great,” Louis mutters, and he lets his eyes wander over to Harry walking out of the bathroom. The two make eye contact and it’s much too late for hiding, but Louis ducks under his menu anyways. He peers slyly from the top to see Harry return to his two-seater booth that’s only a few tables across from his own. Of fucking course.
“Lou, you okay?” Zayn asks, giving Thomas a small look because his name is not Hugh.
“I’m fine,” Louis mumbles, tilting to the side in an attempt to catch a glimpse at the person Harry is sitting with.
He sits all the way on edge of his seat, leaning over as far as he can go. He sees the figure and makes out that it’s a girl. He leans even more to see her blonde hair.
Thick eyebrows…
Sharp cheekbones…
“Lou! Be caref-”
“Shit!” Louis all but yells, falling out of his chair and onto the floor.
Well, at least he can get a better look of the girl now.
“Oh geez, are you okay… Lou?” Thomas asks, and Louis is sure that he had to look at Zayn for confirmation of his name, but he can’t think about that right now since pretty much everyone is staring at him.
“Yeah, uh, m’fine.” Louis quickly gathers himself and sits gracefully back down on his seat, avoiding eye contact with anyone.
Well, except for Harry, who is biting back a large grin and Louis knows he’s mentally laughing at Louis.
“You ok?” Harry mouths discreetly.
Louis gives him a sarcastic thumbs up, mouthing back “I’m perfect” before returning to his date.
“… and so I was just like, dude, my 14 year old sister can take better head shots than these.” Louis hears Thomas ramble on. “So yeah, long story short, I ended up going to this real legit art photographer to take my head shots. Like, c’mon, I’m not gonna half-ass it. I need my pictures to represent my real beauty, you know? Zayn knows what I mean, don’t you, mate?”
Louis makes a disgusted face and gives Liam a wide-eyed look, who just gives a meek shrug and mouths, “Sorry”.
Five minutes or so pass, and Louis can’t stop sneaking peaks over at Harry, who seems to be doing the same thing.
If Louis’ being honest, Harry looks just as miserable on his date, and that’s not his own bitterness speaking. They both share weak half smiles and Harry looks at his date once, looking back at Louis and nodding towards the bathroom.
“I have to go pee,” Louis announces, getting up slowly.
“You just went,” Liam says sternly, and it’s clear that he doesn’t want Louis to leave.
Louis licks his lips and shrugs. “I have to take a shit.”
Then he scampers off to the bathroom with a much too large grin, leaning against the sink and waiting for Barista Boy.
“How’s your date going?” Harry says as he enters, leaning beside Louis and places his hands so close to Louis’. It’s not fair.
“Fantastic! He’s a model,” Louis says mockingly. “I love hearing about how he needs better head shots to represent his true beauty.”
“Cara is a model, too,” Harry looks down and stifles his laugh, shaking his head a bit. He bites his lip and pauses for a moment, reluctantly looking up and opening his mouth. “Let’s get out of here.”
“What? You’re crazy,” Louis chuckles, but that sounds like an awfully good idea.
“C’mon,” Harry urges, giving Louis’ elbow a little nudge. “It’s clear that none of us are having a good time. Let’s do something fun.”
Louis grins and shakes his head, eyeing around the piss-old-lady-soap room and sucking in his cheeks. “Okay.”
“Okay? Yeah?”
“Yeah, okay,” Louis says, laughing and looking up at Harry’s cheery eyes (which Louis can probably stare at forever, honestly).
“Okay.” Harry nods and promptly grabs onto Louis’ hand, exchanging a quick look before slowly leading out the bathroom. “Stay close.”
“That won’t be a problem,” Louis whispers to himself, but he swears he can see a hint of a smile on Harry’s face.
They walk along with a family that’s leaving, ducking their heads low and holding onto each other’s hands tightly, and Louis loves the rush. The rush of being with Harry.
Once the two have made it to the front, they each let out a collective sigh of relief and smirk at each other, walking out hand-in-hand.
“That was…”
“Great,” Louis finishes, keeping his hand grasped around Harry’s. “I believe you owe me a proper Valentine’s dinner, Harry.”
“Alright, if you say so, Louis,” Harry beams, walking down into the populated centre.
Louis doesn’t know if it’s because it’s Valentine’s Day, or because it’s night time, or because there are so many couples outside, but he feels so content and mushy gushy and maybe he has underestimated Valentine’s Day and all its goodness. Either way, he’s pretty sure he’s already falling head over heels for some guy he’s known for less than an hour.
The duo ends up in a donut shop, which is filled with couples feeding each other and flirting openly. It’s kind of cute, but in a disgusting way.
“So, tell me about yourself,” Harry says between nibbles of a cream-filled donut, and Louis has to direct his mind away from dirty jokes.
“I’m shit at talking about myself,” Louis admits, sipping delicately from his coffee mug.
“Fine.” Harry finishes off the donut in one bite and wipes his lips. “I’ll say a random fact and you’ll say a random fact.”
“Okay,” Louis smiles, and he’s sure that Harry’s head is just full of brilliant ideas.
“Cara actually isn’t my date, she’s just a friend. I took her out because she was moping about being alone on Valentine’s Day,” Harry says, not breaking eye contact with Louis.
“How ironic,” Louis mumbles with a small smile. “My twat of a friend forced me to go on a blind double-date thing with some model guy who doesn’t even know my name.”
Harry laughs a crinkly eye laugh and Louis can only smile in adoration. Harry licks his lips and looks up, staying silent for a moment. “I haven’t stopped thinking of you since I served you coffee this morning.”
“I hate coffee.” Louis smiles widely at Harry’s surprised expression, giving a small nod of confirmation. “I’m more a tea person, but here I am, drinking coffee. I think I have you to blame.”
“Are you trying to say I made such a great cup of coffee this morning that it has entirely changed your views?” Harry asks with a sarcastic/astounded tone.
“Precisely.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere, Louis.”
“I know.”
So the two go on like that for a while – sharing useless facts and giggling like schoolgirls every so often. It’s quite serene and – if Louis is being honest – romantic, maybe.
“I fancy you a lot,” Harry chimes after a while, reaching for Louis’ coffee cup and taking a sip. “Also, I can make a way better cup than this.”
“I fancy you a lot, too,” Louis says without much thought, grinning widely and nodding. “And yeah, you could.”
“Wanna test that theory?”
“Yeah, I do,” Louis nods again, and the two are out the door hand-in-hand once again. They walk freely through the streets again, reveling in the sights and in each other’s presence. They’re so caught up in each other and Louis thinks maybe, just maybe, his love life isn’t all that sucky.
++
The two wind up in Harry’s flat, snuggled against one another with promised cups of coffee while watching re-runs of Full House (which Harry can quote word-for-word, and Louis knows that he’s a keeper).
They’re already halfway through their 6th episode when his phone buzzes.
saw u sneak out wit that boy in that girly heart shirt… i told thomas that u had a business call and didn’t get to say goodbye
ur welcome, twat
- Li
ps. happy valentine’s day, love u xx
Louis smiles and quickly types back a response.
his name is harry and we’re going to get married some day
love you too (:
And for once, Louis doesn’t end up having sex on the first date. For once, he doesn’t feel like he’s going to regret waking up in a different flat this time. For once, he thinks maybe he might’ve actually found love.
But it’s too quick to jump to conclusions, so all he can do is fall asleep soundly in Harry’s arms and hope this will become a regular thing. He hopes he can keep these cups of coffee and cheesy pick-up lines and marathons of Full House.
And he definitely hopes he can keep Harry.