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The shoe shop. Louis’ first day off from work in months was about to be spent in the shoe shop. His Vans, that he’d had for at least 2 years, were starting to pinch. He winced at the slight pain, uncomfortable in the black shoes.
He sighed and took in his surroundings, mothers with their children getting back to school shoes took up the majority of the space. He turned around to observe his shoe options. He wanted Vans, naturally, the same colours as the ones he had on. Scuffing his dirty shoe against the rug, he picked up the pair of black and white lace up trainers from the shelf and looked around to see if there was room for him to try them on.
Turning around too quickly, Louis’ body smacked into whatever was behind him. More likely, whoever. He went to apologise to whoever he’d just knocked over but the words got caught in his throat as he drank in the copious amounts of springy curls and sparkling green eyes.
The sales assistant cleared his throat as Louis blushed and adjusted the beanie atop his head with his free hand. “I’m sorry about that, I’m Harry, is there anything you need help with today?” Louis looked at his feet with a sudden interest in the scuff marks on his shoes. “Um, I’m Louis and I was just wondering if I could have these shoes in my size please, a size 9.” Harry raised an eyebrow, no way was this tiny man a 9. Louis sighed as he took note of Harry’s facial expression. “Fine then. An 8.” Harry sighed and looked at Louis again. “Maybe I’m a size 7 then.” Louis was adamant that he’d absolutely not shrunk, regardless of his height and age. Harry smirked and turned away to get Louis his shoes.
They were too big. At 21 years of age, a size 7 was too big. Louis was ready for the ground to swallow him whole as he watched Harry traipse back and forth with multiple shoe boxes for him to try on.
After Harry had been sent to fetch Louis yet another set of shoes, he had an idea. He picked up a smaller box off the opposite shelf and took them back to Louis. He watched as Louis swung his legs backwards and forwards, he was so endeared by this man he’d met only half an hour ago. He cleared his throat when he got a bit closer making the smaller of the two look up. Harry held out the boxes for Louis to take, He smiled gratefully at Harry, who was obviously use to this treatment by customers.
Louis unwrapped one of the shoes from one of the smaller boxes as his eyebrows furrowed into a tight crease down the center of his forehead. “Um Harry, are you sure these are the right shoes?” He looked up at through his eyelashes, his baby blues popping. Harry grinned, surprised that he hadn’t caught on to what Harry had done. He laid the shoes flat on the floor ready to push his foot in when he looked up at Harry again, his eyes full of confusion. “Harry, are you sure these aren’t err-“ his voice got smaller towards the end of his sentence. Harry beamed down at him. “What was that Lou?” Louis exhaled and looked up. “Are you sure these aren’t kids shoes, Harry, I can hardly just get them on.” Harry had to bite his lip to stop himself from laughing at the situation, Louis looked between Harry and the shoes and burst into a fit of laughter making the surrounding customers look around in surprise. His eyes were watering and his cheeks were red because he was laughing so hard, Harry had never seen a person so breath taking before.
Eventually, when Louis sat upright after his fit of giggles, he picked up a shoe-box he had earlier, a size 6, and handed them to Harry. “I’d like to have these ones please and your phone number too.” Louis’ eyes went wide at the realisation of what had just come out of his mouth, he didn’t know anything about Harry let alone if he was even gay-
“Of course you can, princess.” Louis’ thoughts were cut short when he heard Harry’s deep, mellow voice.
He went home with a new pair of shoes and a phone number scrawled across the receipt.