if you want me to write a poem (about you) [e.c]

Chapter 1

before

The first time Louis meets Eleanor, they're at a party. She's dressed to kill in a black sparkly mini dress and red fuck me heels, but her brown curly hair is everywhere and her smoky eye makeup is smeared a little more than Louis suspects it started out. She collapses next to Louis on the sofa, drink in hand, and flutters her eyelashes up at him.

"Hey there," she says, voice huskier than Louis was expecting, and then she puts her head on Louis' shoulder and sighs. Louis freezes, trying to decide what to do or say or what, and then the bottle in Eleanor's hand starts to tip out of it just slow enough for Louis to catch it before it actually spills everywhere.

Louis blinks and realises she's fallen asleep. He supposes he doesn't blame her--it's nearing half three in the morning, and he'd sat down in the first place because he was tired.

He sits there for fifteen minutes with this strange girl breathing softly onto his neck and the taste of the alcopop he'd finished drinking for her on his tongue. He doesn't mind, really; he hadn't been planning on going anywhere in any case. She eventually wakes up, blinking slowly up at him for a moment before her lips curl up into a tiny smile.

Louis thinks it's possible he's been thoroughly fucked while he wasn't paying attention.

"Sorry," Eleanor says, sitting up. "How long've I been out?"

"Not long," Louis says.

"Mmm," she hums. The party is dying down around them despite the loud bass of the house music that's still blaring out of the shitty sound system, but Louis doesn't think he'll ever notice anything that isn't the colour of this girl's eyes again. They're the kind of pale brown that makes Louis think of the undersides of dead leaves, rimmed with dark that reminds him of chocolate, and he wants to go home and write pages upon pages of poetry about the way they contrast with the pink of her lips. "I'm Eleanor," she adds. "I'll just call you Pillow, yeah?"

Louis laughs a little. "You can if you want," he says, "but my actual name is Louis."

"Like a king," Eleanor says. "S'nice to meet you."

"Nice to be acquainted with your curls," Louis says. "I like them; we struck up quite the kinship whilst you were sleeping."

ELeanor giggles. "Hm," she says, picking up one of her curls and considering it. "What do you know, they seem to like you as well."

"Good," Louis says. He's stuck on what to say next, still a bit drunk and a lot tired and not in any way fit to be conversing with a pretty girl. Eleanor pulls her phone out of where she'd been keeping it in her bra and winces when she presses the unlock button.

"I've got to go, my friend's been texting me," Eleanor says, standing. She wobbles a little on her heels, and Louis reaches out to steady her. "Bye, Louis. See you around."

"Bye, Eleanor's curls," Louis says, and he can hear her laughing even when he can't see her anymore.

-

Louis is staring blankly ahead of him when Zayn sits down next to him a few minutes later and asks, "Who was that earlier?"

Louis blinks, shrugs at her, then remembers how to use his tongue long enough to say, "Eleanor," before he forgets again.

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