I'm Not Fine At All

Chapter 48

It was the day of young Harry's seventeenth birthday party and to say he was wound up would be an understatement. He was hopping around the apartment, bouncing off the walls, as he squealed about how excited he was for his birthday party. Liam had banished him from the kitchen because he had almost knocked him down when he was making his cake, so now Harry was running around in the living room, checking decorations and marking things in his little notebook he carried around in his back pocket. Harry had decided on having his party the day before his birthday because Louis had told him he had a big surprise for him on his actual birthday. The younger boy knew it was going to be something good since Louis had spent the whole week leading up to the big day giving Harry little gifts and surprises to show the boy how much he loved him.

"Liam, did you set up the music yet?" Harry called from the living room, looking around at the speakers stationed around the room. Liam groaned internally, taking a deep breath before he yelled back, "Yes, Harry, I've told you a million times! Don't touch anything or I swear I will break your little fingers off!" Harry giggled, too happy to even take anything Liam said seriously, and went over the room one more time. Everything was perfect. The lights, the streamers, the cut-out pictures of totally hot guys from some of Liam's old porno magazines. The boy chuckled when he saw a photo of a completely nude, body-builder-looking guy with Zayn's face taped over his. It was quite the artistic masterpiece on Liam's part.

"Haz, what are you doing? Everything is all set, stop fussing. Why don't you go shower and get dressed? Spend a little time on your hair, blow dry it and everything. That'll kill some time before the party starts." Liam came into the living room wiping his hands on a towel as he spoke to Harry. He really didn't care what Harry was doing, he just wanted him out of his hair for the next hour so he could get all of his presents ready and out on the table. Harry would be too hard to handle if he was there while the presents were being laid out. Liam knew he had a history of getting a little over-excited when it came to gifts.

Harry nodded at the older boy and happily skipped out of the room, grabbing his towel from his bedroom before locking himself in the bathroom. Liam sighed in relief and sat down on the couch, wanting to take a deep breath before he started in on the presents. He went to his bedroom and dug around under his bed, pulling out the ridiculous stack of presents that had been placed there weeks ago. Liam felt that since it was Harry's first birthday without Robin and Anne, he should make up for it with loads of presents, some sentimental, some not. His wallet was currently the most tired it had ever been, but it was worth it for Liam to see the enormous grin on Harry's face when he opened them.

Liam carried the stack of presents into the living room and laid them out on the coffee table, which they had decorated with streamers and a large sign that read "PRESENTS" followed by about four hundred exclamation points. Harry had made it if you couldn't tell. Liam organized the wrapped boxes so that they didn't look like they were about to topple over and then laid the last and most important gift on top of the stack where it looked like the center of attention. He smiled as he looked back over the room once more, proud of himself for what he had done with the place. His phone beeped, notifying him that the party started in an hour, and he went back into the kitchen to finish decorating the now-cooled cake.

The doorbell, which was almost never used, rang about thirty minutes before the party started. Liam frowned in confusion at the clock and wiped his icing-covered hands off before opening the door to reveal a grinning Zayn with a large stack of gifts in his arms. "Mate!" Zayn cheered stumbling into the apartment as he tried to balance the things in his arms. Liam helped steady him and lead him into the living room where they set the presents down on the table. "Hope you don't mind but I kind of completely blew the budget you gave me for Harry's gifts. It's just, they recently knocked some money off of my rent because the maintenance team all quit since they weren't being paid that much and I just had a lot more money than I usually have, so I went a little crazy at the mall, and on Etsy, and at that new music store. I will warn you, though. Not everything I got him is PG-13. There is some R and X-Rated shit in there."