Chapter Text
In my dreams – prologue
Harry was not a people-person, to summarize it. He’d rather not go out if it wasn’t absolutely necessary. Which meant he only ever went out if he ran out of food or drawing supplies. And he always tried to get one of his friends to do the grocery shopping for him. He only ever bought his drawing supplies himself. No one picked the right pencils or the right type of paper to sketch on.
Moving on to the topic of friends. Harry only had two, but that was okay. Niall had been his best friend since kindergarten and he knew the Irish boy like the back of his hand. Ashton had moved from Australia to Holmes Chapel a few years ago and his happy, bubbly personality and contagious laugh made that Harry accepted him into their little group very quickly.
They were all very close, despite Ashton and Niall having several other friends.
Neither of them ever forced Harry to do something he didn’t want to do. They respected the fact Harry hated coming out of his house. Ashton had once tried to convince him to come to a club with him. The idea alone had frightened him and instead of going to a club, Ashton ended up apologizing over and over and promising to never ask it again.
Harry had three passions: cooking, writing and drawing.
Cooking was something he did when he was immensely frustrated or extraordinarily hungry.
He had countless files saved on his laptop; each file containing stories about different characters. Not one character was similar to another but they all had one thing in common: they lived adventurous lives – something Harry had only ever dreamed of.
His current sketchbook, carefully put away in the second drawer of his desk, was filled with drawings of his characters going on adventures. There was no character who didn’t have at least three drawings in Harry’s sketchbooks. He simply couldn’t write about someone without having an image of them.
There was his current favourite Liam (whom he liked because Liam was just an ordinary boy from the 17th century – Harry tended to forget his characters did not actually exist) who could be seen fighting off pirates on his ship and there was Zayn (whom Harry considered to be his best character; flawed but somehow perfect too) finding the skeleton of his former best friend who’d betrayed him.
Niall and Ashton had tried many times to understand Harry’s fantasy world, but they never truly could.
They didn’t get how creating a new character with new storylines could make Harry forget about the world for days. It wasn’t like they didn’t try – they did, all the time, but they didn’t get it. They both did support Harry, of course.
Ashton always encouraged him to bundle his stories into a book and get it published but Harry never thought his stories would be good enough to become an actual book.
Niall was always willing to try out new recipes if Harry was cooking because he was stuck on the story he was currently working on.
Harry couldn’t have asked for better friends. They might not understand his fantasy world, but they tried and they supported him in everything and that meant so much more than he could ever tell them.
“Haz, what did you call us over for?” Ashton asks as soon as Harry opens the door for him and Niall.
“I need your help”, Harry says as Ashton and Niall toe off their shoes and enter the living room.
“I got your groceries yesterday”, Ashton says confused (Harry never lets Niall get the groceries because he’ll only bring crisps for himself and no actual groceries for Harry).
Harry sighs. “I know.”
“Did I bring the wrong stuff?”
It’s endearing how Ashton is immediately concerned about how he might have done something wrong, Harry thinks. “No, it’s not that, Ash. It’s just that I’m stuck on my writing.”
“You usually only call me when you’re stuck”, Niall says, raising an eyebrow.
“I’ve never been stuck like this. I’m not stuck on something I’m working on – I just have no ideas at all.”
“So you called us over to distract you”, Ashton guesses.
Harry nods slightly. “Kinda. I hoped I’d get new ideas from the two of you.”
“You mean, like, base a character on us?”
Harry nods again. “Yeah.”
“So what do we do?” Ashton says and he leans back on the couch. Niall is munching on some crisps he probably pulled out of his pocket.
“Just play Fifa and hang out with me. Don’t act any different from how you normally do.”
Ashton does his giggle-laugh. “Now I’m going to be extremely aware of my behaviour, you know that, right?”
Harry laughs too. “I know, but just act normal.” Niall shrugs and throws a controller at Ashton.
“Heyyyyy, that could’ve hit my head”, Ashton whines.
“Shut up and play Fifa with me, Aussie.”
And soon Niall and Ashton are engaged in their game of Fifa. Harry has gotten his sketchbook and notepad from his room and he’s sketching the facial features of a boy and writing down small notes in his notepad about his looks – blue eyes, brown hair, tan skin and a quirky smile which made his eyes wrinkle at the corners.
“How’s that character coming along, Haz?” Ashton asks eventually, trying to focus on tackling Niall’s football player and Harry’s answer at the same time.
“Fine”, Harry mutters absently, erasing some lines from the boy’s face.
“I win!” Niall cheers after a short silence.
Ashton throws his controller on the couch. “Fine, you win. I’d still say you cheated though.”
“How can I cheat when we’re playing Fifa?”
“You’re Niall, you’d find a way”, Ashton huffs. “Should I order some pizza, Haz?”
“Hm?”
“Pizza. If you want me to order pizza”, Ashton repeats.
“Yes please. Niall, could you get my coloured pencils for me?” Harry asks.
“Sure”, Niall says and he goes to Harry’s room to retrieve the pencils while Ashton orders pizza over the phone.
-
Harry has a little trouble putting down his pencils and sketchbook when the pizza’s delivered. Ashton has to repeatedly ask him to put away his drawing supplies because his pizza’s getting cold.
“Come on, Haz, you need to eat”, Niall encourages him.
“But I just got started”, he complains.
“Haz, you’ve been working on this the entire afternoon”, Ashton reminds him.
“Have I?” he mutters and Ashton nods.
“Come on, Harry, eat the pizza.” Ashton widens his eyes and pouts and he knows Harry is pretty much defenceless against his pleading eyes.
“Alright”, Harry sighs and he puts down his sketchbook, taking a slice of pizza and eating it slowly.
“So, tell me about your character”, Niall says through a mouthful of pizza.
“Don’t speak when you’ve got food in your mouth”, Ashton scolds him.
“He’s a bit like a mix between the two of you. I only have to do the colouring and then I’m done. He might just be my favourite so far”, Harry tells and his eyes sparkle.
“What’s his name?”
“I don’t have one yet. He’s got your eyes, Niall, and your genuine smile, Ash. I still have to come up with a storyline for him but I don’t think that’ll be a problem anymore.”
“Good”, Ashton smiles. “Glad we could help you.”
-
When Ashton and Niall leave after dinner, Harry looks at his sketches again. He’s thought about names during dinner but he can’t come up with one that does the boy justice.
But that night, when he’s just turned the lights off, a name pops into his head. Louis.
And well, that’s where our story starts.