next to you ❀ l.s.

nineteen - desire

"I want you."

The blue-eyed boy coughed, choking on his own surprise. "You what?"

"You're right." There were tears in Harry's eyes now, shining like silver yet too shallow to spill over. "I-I just want to do things for other people because it makes me feel . . . wanted. Needed," he confessed shakily. "But what I . . . the person I really want is you."

He couldn't speak even his own feelings as eloquently as Louis could. All he could do was try.

"You don't want me," Louis shook his head slowly, about to start backing away. "You're just upset and you think sex will make you forget, but it won't."

Harry bit his trembling lower lip, still standing across the room with a good amount of space between them. "Don't want to forget," he mumbled, his voice only barely audible even in the otherwise silent room.

"What?"

"Don't want to --"

"Speak up, Harry."

"I don't want to forget," he said again, a bit louder this time. "I want to be with you."

Louis snorted -- a useless attempt to cover up rising uneasiness climbing up from his stomach to settle in the back of his throat. His patience was running thin, but so was his resolve. "Sure seemed like you wanted to be with that guy."

Harry's eyes widened almost comically, like a young child who had just been accused of lying. "N-No! No, I didn't want him."

"Harry," he sighed wearily, covering his face with his hands as he shook his head again. "Harry."

"I-I wanted you. Needed you," Harry whispered. He tugged nervously at his fingers, ringing his hands together in front of him. Desperation and anxiety radiated from him in suffocating waves. "I just didn't know how to ask."

Louis hesitated. So far, he was pretty good at reading Harry, but right now, he just couldn't tell if Harry really meant what he said or if he was just trying to get what he wanted.

And then, Louis decided that he didn't even care.

He closed the distance between them in a few long strides, cupping Harry's cheeks with his hands. His blue eyes burned into Harry's already-heated skin, as though Harry's deepest, most sincere thoughts were written all over his face and he could read them like a book. The younger boy's eyes were wide and hopeful, cheeks flushed and lips swollen from the lips of another man.

And Louis suddenly wanted to kiss Harry until he forgot that anyone else had ever touched him.

His voice was husky, full of lust when he spoke: "You don't ever have to ask me for anything," he said firmly, and then he surged forward to capture Harry's lips with his own.

Harry inhaled sharply, like he wasn't really expecting to get what he asked for, but he melted against Louis's chest. His arms wrapped around the older boy's neck, his fingers tangling in the soft hair at the nape of his neck, and he tugged gently.

Louis groaned and pulled him closer by the waist. With their lips still connected, he walked them backwards down the hallway (and took a moment to be thankful that their two apartments were nearly identical) until they reached Harry's bedroom. He paused in the doorway, pressing Harry against the doorframe.

When Harry's back hit the wooden frame and he gasped in surprise, Louis slipped his tongue between the younger boy's parted lips, tasting him properly for the first time. Their mouths moved together so naturally that Louis could barely believe they had only kissed twice before; somehow, he already felt like he knew Harry's body like the back of his hand.