Make Me Beg ➸ Larry Stylinson

nine

Harry POV:

"So you've never played pool before?" I ask, handing Louis a spare cue. It's nearly as tall as he is, and I realize that he's shorter than I thought; not short (he's about an average height) but maybe I'm just tall.

"Does it count if I've played pool on my phone?" He grins sheepishly.

"What? No, that doesn't count!"

"Oh, well that's too bad. I'm a Game Pigeon 8-ball master!" I've never heard of 'Game Pigeon 8-ball' but I assume it must resemble pool to a degree.

"I'll start off with the basics," I say, grabbing my regular pool cue that's leaned against the wall.

The set of balls are already set up in the familiar triangle formation, with the cue ball sitting on the table at the opposite end. 

"That's the cue ball," I say, pointing to the isolated white ball, "And those are the 15 solid and striped balls. One through seven are solid colors, the eight ball is black, and nine through fifteen are striped."

He nods, looking down at the table. "Which ones do you hit into the pockets?"

"One player wants to hit all the solids in while the other wants to hit all the stripes in. Then, once you hit all your designated pool balls, the way to win is to hit the eight ball into a pocket that you call ahead of time."

"What if you miss?"

"If you miss, it's not a big deal. The only time it really matters is when you call the pocket you plan to get the eight ball into a certain pocket, but it ends up going into a different pocket. In that case scenario, you would lose."

"And you hit the white cue ball at the beginning of every shot, right?"

"Yeah," I say, walking over to take aim at the cue ball.

"Okay, then this is just like the game on my phone! Except I don't know how to take a proper shot with this stick,"

I wave him over and he walks towards me, leaning on his own pool cue while he watches how I set my hands up. I use my non-dominant hand to act as a makeshift tripod for the cue to rest on top of, and my other one grips the cue a few inches from its end.

"When you shoot," I say, crouching down to properly aim, "Be careful not to aim your cue too far down or you'll hit and damage the turf. Keep it somewhat level so you can hit the ball in the center."

I wind up my shot and hit the cue ball, causing it to fly forward and break the formation of the triangle. The balls scatter and a blue striped ball makes it into the far right pocket.

"That's a break, right?" He asks and I nod. 

"Want to try?"

"Yeah, could I?" I reset the balls into their triangle shape and he walks over to where I took my shot. Louis goes to set up his hands but looks confused and turns to me for help, his cheeks flushed pink.

I walk up to him, glad to help.

"Are you right or left-handed?"

"Right,"

"Okay, me too. Niall's left-handed so if you ever see him play, he'll use the opposite hand positions as us," I say, "To start, put your left hand down on the table as I did so the cue has something to steadily rest on."

He puts his hand down and I reposition it a bit. His hand is cool to the touch, and I can see scars from cuts on his fingers here and there, but they're healed and look old.

"I got those cuts in culinary school," He says abruptly as if reading my mind, "Long story short we went through lots of knife skills training and it didn't come easily to me. Took loads of practice but now I can perfectly dice a carrot or something with my eyes closed without cutting myself, so it paid off."