Chapter Text
He is trying to catch his breath in the few seconds it takes Jackson to grab his hair tighter and push his head back in the toilet. He doesn’t succeed and when he is back under, his eyes squeezed shut and lungs climbing up his throat to try getting air, Harry feels the embarrassing sting of tears coming on and that makes it so much worse.
At least, he can be thankful he won’t be seen crying today, since they decided to torture him in the toilets. His father was in a bad mood that morning and Harry was right there, so it was only logical that he was to be blamed for a very important meeting going very wrong. Sadly, Jackson and Mark and the rest of them decided to go through their weekly routine of “having some fun with Styles” today of all days, so the tears were to be expected really. Harry still blames himself though, because if only he were stronger and tougher and more resistant. If only he wasn’t a scrawny, geeky idiot and his every move material for ridicule and humiliation of everyone in this hell they call high school.
They don’t let him go until his head is properly soaked and there is disgusting toilet water dripping down on his shirt and trousers. His glasses are missing and he is scared, truly and utterly scared, because he is blind without those things and these lads that just provided him with a toilet shower are not likely to help him find his way out of the building and towards a taxi. He is shaking and there are actual hot tears streaming down his cheeks, he can feel them, even if the other three boys laughing right across the bathroom can’t see them. He doesn’t move, just keeps clenching and unclenching his hands, hoping he will find the damn glasses.
“See you tomorrow sweetheart. Say hello to daddy for me, will ya?”, Jackson says, crouching in front him and making the two boys behind them laugh. Harry blinks, breathing shallow while still trying to make the world stop spinning and the plea to help him find the damn glasses is halfway over his lips when he manages to stop himself. He will not beg, not now and not ever, because no matter how low a self-esteem he really had, he still had enough pride to nod at the idiot and turn his head away. Jackson laughs again, kicks something on the ground towards him and leaves.
Grabbing around the item, Harry realizes those are the glasses. Carefully, he lifts them up and pushes them against his face, hand faintly trembling. The lenses are not broken, but the temple and earpiece part is thorn off at one side. Harry locates it a little further away on the floor and scrambles towards it on all fours. Slowly, he stands up, holding his glasses with one hand and looks at himself in the mirror. Soaking wet and trembling, clothes disheveled and his shoes dirty from the scramble they had in the grass outside, when the idiots grabbed him and he tried resisting. It didn’t work though, it never does. They are the hunters and he is the prey and there is nothing he could ever do about it, not since he came here two years ago at least.
He sorts himself out, combs the trembling fingers through his hair as much as he can and straightens his wet tie. The walk from the bathroom to the street outside the school is long and filled with smirks and laughter echoing behind him. No one speaks directly to him though, not even the teachers that pass by. It has been like that ever since Jackson first assaulted him in freshman year. There he is, Harry Styles, the son of the most important man in London. And the weakest creature in the whole city probably. He keeps his head down and walks as fast as he can, forgetting to conceal the limp he acquired last week, when Jackson decided to practice kicking on him.
The taxi driver looks at him, really looks at him as he squeezes in on himself in the back seat. Maybe he is the first person that really looked at him in ages and maybe he has a question on his lips about a soaked, trembling boy he has in the backseat. But the money Harry holds out towards his face silences it all. Because, you see, that is one thing not missing from Harry’s life. Money. The driver turns around and starts the car, glancing once at the rear-view mirror. Harry schools his features to a look of apathy and tries not thinking about today.
He got an award today, for academic excellence, accepted in front of the entire school. He didn’t give a speech, because there was no one there to listen to it. An amphitheater full of students and he was alone in there, thinking of his demanding, strict father and his exceedingly time-consuming job and a bunch of excuses that were never offered for why he won’t be able to come. He thinks of his mother, apologizing over and over again for not being able to take time off of work, because the money was tight on her and she was still paying Gemma’s tuition and it was hard, even with Robin working, Harry knows. And he understands, really he does, but sometimes he just wishes for someone, anyone to give a fuck.
He is half-way home when it hits him, the absence of love and happiness and the true depth of the despair he is living in. Now he will go home and wash his clothes and do all of his homework and hide in his bedroom until father comes home from work. Then he will have to explain why he needs his glasses fixed, again, and father will look at him with that stern disappointment, again, and threaten to call his mother up in Holmes Chapel and complain about what a fucked up son she raised. Harry will nod and accept the scolding and bite his lip. Then he will ask to be excused and go up to his room and lie down in his bed. He will hug that damn award from today, because he has nothing else to hug. His mother will call and ask how he is doing and he will have to lie through his teeth. Because that is the deal. That was the deal two years ago, when Anne barely let him to go live with his father in London and he made excuses about a better school and enough money to buy that kind of education, that will get him into a good college. Both of them will pretend again that it wasn’t what it really was: him leaving home because Anne and Robin simply didn’t have enough money to support both his and Gemma’s education and he had to make a choice. He would choose his mother though, always had and always will, but Anne was crying and Gemma was talking about coming home to work and help provide for him, but how could Harry accept that? He knew they cared and he was thankful because the short two weeks he had to spend with them back home were sometimes enough for him to learn to smile again. But he couldn’t let them give up on their lives and their dreams. He just couldn’t. His own father, one of the wealthiest businessmen in London, didn’t seem like such a bad choice. Until the absolute cold and even worse terror of being a living, walking reminder of his father’s biggest mistake realized itself in the mirror of his expectations and Harry crumbled. He never learned how to be strong or bold or mean or generally not give a fuck.
His mother will then say goodbye and he will nod because he still can’t make himself say it out loud and then that will be it. Alone in the dark, touched only by the most expensive sheets money can buy, Harry will remain still. Him and the pain in his ribs from the kicking of last week, that is. Summer is coming in three months and father will expect of him to use the gym or the swimming pool in the basement of the mansion, to make him look more like a man and less like a failed attempt of one, he supposed. How will he hide the bruises and the scratches, Harry didn’t know.
He could almost feel it, the dark of that room and numerous questions hanging over him, right there in the taxi. Suddenly, he couldn’t breathe and there were flashes of light behind his eyes. The damn air was trying to choke him. Distantly aware that he was slamming his hand down on the seat in front of the driver, Harry only registered when the terrified man stopped the car and turned to look at him. There was fear in those eyes, but also pity, and Harry Styles, in all of his years, was never able to stand pity directed at him, no matter how frail and weak he was.
The door wouldn’t fucking open and he needed to get out, it was imperative that he gets the fuck out!
He kept slamming on them until finally he struck the handle and burst outside, falling on his knees on the sidewalk, gripping his backpack to his chest and heaving. The street was spinning around him, circles of grey and white all around and he couldn’t for the life of him get a breath of air inside.
The taxi driver probably figured that he shouldn’t get himself into whatever drug-addict-shit Harry got himself into, because the sound of screeching tires could clearly be heard, even in the state Harry was in.
With his eyes shut, Harry didn’t notice the door to a bookshop right in front of him opening and a boy around his age running towards him. He felt a hand though, gentle, warm hands, on his cheeks and his forehead, coaxing breath into him. One, two, three, four, five, a voice counted loudly above him, a stern and worried tone to it, so disproportional to the hands stroking his face that Harry was almost compelled to open his eyes just to see who the person was. When he did, it was only a silhouette of a head leaning above him, strands of short hair feathery around it. The brightness of the sky above bothered him though, so he shut his eyes again.
“Can you hear me?”, the counting voice said and Harry tried to get his throat to clear enough so he could speak, but nothing came out.
“Just nod if you can, alright?”, the boy said and Harry realized that he could nod, so he did.
“Alright, let me try to get you inside, you are wet all over…”
And with that, the boy pulled him up, first in a sitting position, then crouched down and draped Harry’s arm around his shoulders to lift him up. It worked, the standing up part, but his breathing started getting worse again and the guy holding him suddenly appeared in his line of sight, holding Harry up across his shoulders, patting his back like he did something great and not just fucking had a meltdown in front of this guy.
“Look at me.”, the guy said and Harry had to obey, because that voice wasn’t something you ever said no to.
He opened his eyes slowly and there he was. The boy was shorter than him, brown hair and tanned, frowning and biting his lip in concentration. And God, the eyes. Clear, blue, bright, alive with life, those eyes lured him in, forwards, until he was physically tipping over the smaller lad. The boy squeaked and gripped him tighter, huffing and widening his eyes.
“Easy lad, easy. Calm down and try to stabilize. Breathe, you hear me? You have to breathe!”
Harry tried, he really did and it was working. There was air in his lungs and that made him relieved and a little bit dizzy. His arms could hold onto the boy though and hold the did, gripping at the back of his shirt.
“Ok, slowly now, hold onto my shoulders and I will walk you inside, alright?”
Harry nodded again and the guy let go of his shoulders to support him from the left and then they were moving. Or the boy was dragging him, more like, towards the door of the shop in front of them. It was slow and very gradual, but Harry was coming to his senses. Getting inside from the brightness of the day, into the half-darkness of a bookshop certainly helped.
“Niall!”, the boy beside him literally screamed and Harry flinched.
“Sorry.”, the boy whispered when he noticed.
Then there was another, frown in place and a biscuit in his hand, a blonde with a gentle, bright face and smiling lines all over.
“What the fuck mate?”, he said, a thick Irish accent coming through.
“Don’t mate me, go outside and pick his backpack up.”, the boy holding him ordered and Niall stared at him for a second, scanning Harry up and down before shrugging and running outside.
“Let’s get you sitting down yeah?”, the boy turned to him and pointed to an armchair to his right.
Harry sat into it almost by himself, letting the boy hold him up only a little.
“There you go.”
He smiled and Harry blinked a few times before even attempting to smile back, too mesmerized by the brightness of it.
“What’s your name?”, he asked and Harry honestly thought about the answer. His insides were trembling still and there was something in him just waiting for this wonderful, bright boy to turn vicious and spiteful and hit him or laugh at the state of him.
“Harry.”, he said simply though, voice calm and quiet, because if Harry Styles’ upbringing while in the care of his father thought him anything, it was how to internalize fear, doubt and despair.
“Nice to meet you Harry. I am Louis.”, the boy said and Harry thought how the name suits him. It was a nice name for a nice boy.
He was staring right at Harry, his eyes open and unguarded and expression simple. There was something there though, a caution that was barely visible. Harry thought how it wasn’t really his problem, because a guy like this, with confidence and cheerfulness overflowing the edges of his character is bound to forget about a bullied nerd as soon as he escorted him back to his hell of a life. If he didn’t find some sick way of degrading him beforehand, that is.
Niall burst through the door, putting the bell above in a frenzy of ringing that nearly hurt Harry’s ears. He cringed and Louis shook his head at Niall’s brisk pace.
“Um, mate, are these yours?”, Niall held out his glasses, both the lenses and the torn off temple at Harry and the boy blinked at him and then nodded his head slowly. Some part of him was expecting for Niall to laugh and smash the glasses immediately, but then he shook his head in annoyance. Harry was naturally a trusting, kind person and this caution, a habit he acquired to expect the worse, always the most vile, that made him cringe. Changing who he was wasn’t an option, even if things were never good lately.
“I could probably fix them for ya?”, Niall leaned his head to the side, scanning him up and down again, frowning a bit, but not unkind. He was really trying to help, even if he didn’t know anything about him and Harry smiled kindly.
When Niall disappeared somewhere to the back of the bookshop, Harry turned his head around to catch Louis staring at him. Now, people staring wasn’t something new for Harry, but it was somewhat new to have someone this attractive stare at him with kindness and not a hint of malice. And then he had a blush to deal with, because thinking that Louis was hot (even though he was, ridiculously so) shouldn’t even be on his mind now. Louis averted his eyes politely as soon as he noticed Harry was blushing and patted his back again.
“Your clothes are soaking wet Harry, I don’t have anything here that might fit you to change, but maybe you could take that shirt of and let me dry it?”, Louis asked, biting his lip adorably and Harry’s eyes nearly bulged out.
“Don’t… You… Louis…”, he started and then shook his head in annoyance. Words still wouldn’t form into clear sentences for him.
But Louis was wiping a few drops of water off his face that ended up on him in the shaking-head-in –annoyance process and smiled again.
“Look mate, I know a panic attack when I see one and that one you just head was… You can’t just shake it off, alright? Sit down and just calm down a bit, but we can’t have you catching a cold in that, can we? Besides, Niall will take at least a half an hour to fix your glasses and you are kind of soaking my armchair.”
At that, Harry tried leaping to his feet, but ended up simply lurching forward at Louis, who grabbed him like he did outside.
“Ok, shit, calm down again, I said that wrong!”, he shouted at Harry and pushed him back into the armchair.
“Sorry, sorry, fuck the armchair, it doesn’t matter, just… breathe again, all right?”, and he looked at Harry fiercely, pleading and panicky just a little bit, which somehow calmed him again.
“Look, I have a blanket in the back, I’ll bring it here and you can wrap it around yourself and give me the shirt and I will hurry with it, ok? I’ll make you a cup of tea, and no, don’t even look at me like that, no one rejects my tea!”
He was holding Harry by the arms again and yes, he was nodding in an instant, even feeling a smile coming on again.
“Alright, be back in a mo, just sit there, alright?”
Harry leaned back a little bit and rubbed at his temples slowly. Panic attacks weren’t something new to him, but they haven’t happened in a while. He had the last one months ago, when his plans to go back home to Holmes Chapel fell through when his father insisted that he attend some business summer school the entire summer. He was about to object, ask for at least a week off because he missed his mum and that wasn’t allowed, was it? That was weak and he wasn’t a mommy’s boy, not under his father’s roof. So when the blows came and he just stood there, taking it, his father got even angrier and he struck him across the face. That happened rarely, because there anybody could see and anybody could ask questions and then what? He remembered dragging his feet up the stairs and locking himself in the bathroom, washing the blood from his split lip before he phoned his mum and lied that he is going to spend the best summer ever in London and how he can’t really make it to Holmes Chapel (and he was so careful not to let home slip through his lips). Anne’s voice was trembling while she complained, but Harry was decisive and stubborn. He had to be, because the other option was going back home forever and letting the burden of all this shit fall on his family, on the people he loved the most. However impossible it may seem, Harry was the one protecting here. But when the line went dead and he knew his mother was still angry, his strength vanished and he was left trembling on the bathroom floor, with air not coming in his lungs and the bright lights on the ceiling swaying this way and that. He got through that one alone, collected himself and took the entire night to school himself into resilience and tomorrow, business school started. At least, Jackson’s grades where shit, as was the case with the rest of his minions, so he wasn’t able to get in and torture him that summer.
Louis’ hand on his shoulder sent little sparks through him and he let the memories go, turning around to take the blanket from him and begin work at the buttons of his shirt. His hands were trembling still and it wasn’t easy, but that one glance at Louis (he turned around and tried to look busy inspecting the shelf with tea above the opposite armchair) awakened the sparks again and he was at least a little warmer as he draped the blanket around his shoulders.
“Um… Louis?”, he said and the boy turned around quickly and dropped a few tea bags in the process.
“You done?”, Louis asked and bent down to pick the tea bags up and the shirt from Harry’s outstretched hand.
“I’m going to…”, he waved his hand in the direction behind Harry and shrugged when he stumbled over the carpet beneath his feet. Harry chuckled before he even knew what he was doing and Louis whipped his head around to stare at him, a smirk on his lips.
“Careful Curly, I bet you’re a bigger klutz than me.”, he said and skipped off, all stripes and bright colors and Harry just stared at him.
“Curly? Curly?!”, he screamed inside, smiling and fidgeting on that chair.
It was around 15 minutes later, when Harry had enough time to calm himself again that Louis came back to the main area of the bookshop with two cups of tea in his hands.
Harry was standing now, strong enough for balance but not confident enough to leave the blanket on the chair, even if he was sufficiently warm, looking at the bookshelves and smiling at the order the books were left in, messy and charming, but impossible to find anything it seemed. Most of the books were old, bought and read and cherished by someone already and Harry thought how he rather liked that, as opposed to the artificial-smelling textbooks he had to live with and the occasional novel he ordered from Amazon.
When Louis walked in and put the tea on the table in front of the armchair, Harry turned around and was met with a raised eyebrow and that smirk again.
“Come on. I dare you to try it and not like it.”, Louis said and pointed at the tea.
Now with steady hands, Harry bent down to pick the tea up and sipped slowly. It was steaming and sour and had no sugar or milk in it and Harry just looked at Louis, coming up with the best compliment he possibly could, but that smirk simply provoked the need to be brutally honest.
“I like it sweetened. With a lot of honey. And I also prefer fruity ones, not the green.”, he said, raising the cup as if he was explaining that everything that was wrong in the world of tea could be described by this very cup.
Louis’ smirk was wiped off in a second and replaced with a frown. He looked ridiculous and cute, huffing and shaking his head in horror at what he just heard.
“You my friend, are horribly wrong! Sweet, fruity tea with honey, seriously, what is even…”, and he spit the words out like they offended him, but he was joking all the while, Harry could see it and it was only because of it that he remained calm.
Raising both of his eyebrows and dipping his head down to take another sip of the tea, Harry smirked himself.
“You see, it will grow on you!”, Louis said and clapped his hands once. Harry honestly wondered what in the world could be more adorable than this guy.
“It might, yes.”, he nodded his head and smiled widely. Louis was blinking at him afterward, like he wasn’t really clear on anything that Harry was and well, he wasn’t, was he?
They sat and sipped the tea in silence for the following few minutes, challenging each other to complain or provoke and just smirking when either of them took a new sip. Louis went to the back once to bring Harry’s shirt, dry but wrinkled, for which Louis apologized at least a dozen times while explaining that he didn’t know how to iron. Harry had to laugh at that. He then went away again while Harry put his shirt on, shrugging the blanket off and pulling the still warm fabric over his shoulders. It was nice and warm and he felt truly better, but whatever this kind human interaction that he wasn’t accustomed to was, it had to end. He had to get home in time, always on time when father was angry, because even though he never really cared on a normal day, he is going to demand attention and absolute obedience today. And he was already late, so the maid that took care of his father’s laundry and meals is going to report it, of course.
Louis came back when Harry was dressed, carrying a jar with honey in it and Harry grinned again. However late, he won’t regret this, never. The sound of laughter filled the room when he left the honey untouched and continued sipping the bitter tea, staring at Louis over the rim of the cup. Louis laughed like he smiled, warm and full and alive and Harry was besotted with him, even though he would not realize it until that night, lying in the dark again, but not thinking only dark thoughts now.
That is how Niall found them, Louis laughing and Harry staring, when he emerged from the back, Harry’s fixed glasses in hand and a grin on his own face.
“Here you go mate, all done.”, he held them out to Harry and looked damn proud while doing it.
They fit perfectly and not a scratch of the fitting that had to be done to the earpiece visible. Harry grinned and thanked him, grabbing for his wallet out of the trousers pocket.
“Oh, no you won’t, leave it mate, alright? “, Niall said and Harry was about to complain when Louis spoke.
“Leave it Curly, it’s fine, really.”, he said and then chuckled when Harry shook his head and opened his wallet.
“At least let me pay you for the tea and the shirt then?”
“No way. Pay for the sweet crap you usually drink, this deliciousness is on the house!”, Louis teased and Harry was left shaking his head and smiling again.
“I really have to go then. Thank you though. Really, thank you so much, I…”, he started the sentence thinking of what was the probability that obviously the two of the London’s nicest guys helped him after that meltdown, but Louis jumped from his seat and leaned over Harry, putting a finger over his lips and shaking his head.
“Don’t worry about it Curls. Nothing of it.”, he said. Harry would probably try to object, but Louis was touching his lips, gentle and warm as everything around him and he was frozen for a moment. Or several minutes really, one of those two.
“Leave the lad be Lou, come on, we have a job to do.”, Niall said from somewhere behind and Harry noticed a twinge of regret splashing Louis’ face, even though it was hidden the next second, the boy straightening himself up and picking Harry’s backpack for him.
“You will be fine?”, he asked Harry while they shook hands.
It was almost a conscious effort for him to not melt in the puddle on the floor and claim that of course he is going to be fine, he got a smile from Louis today, didn’t he? Several of them, to be exact.
He just nodded instead and waved at Niall at the back before bracing himself for the chilly London weather outside and opening the door. The bell announced his exit and he tried to keep walking without glancing back, but he didn’t quite manage it.
When he looked at the store again, Louis was staring right back at him, a hand touching his lips and a worried expression on his face. It made Harry’s insides tingle again.