Cocaine for Breakfast

Chapter 9

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It might be the first time Louis has woken up before someone else. Today, ' someone else ' is Harry. Their legs are tangled and the covers pool around their hips, chilly air floating in from the cracked gap of the window, making Louis shiver slightly. Letting his lashes flutter, he looks straight at the peacefully sleeping face of Harry.

He is snoring softly, little puffs of air escaping his parted lips. With each exhale, a strand of a loose curl blows up and down, almost getting caught between his pink lips.

Louis reaches out, tugging the little bouncy rebellious curl out of his beautiful face and behind his tiny ear. When his fingers make contact with Harry's skin, the boy smacks his lips together, eyes moving under closed lids.

Humming to himself, Louis untangles their legs, trying carefully not to wake Harry completely and slips out from underneath his arm. Harry's finger curl into the sheets when Louis scoots to the edge of the bed.

Stretching, he stands and pads into the bathroom, lazily scratching at his bare hip. Louis turns on the light before washing his face with bone-freezing and mind-awakening water.

Louis dries himself after, trying not to think.

So, yeah without thinking, he opens the cabinet — another bad habit. He's always snooping in people's bathrooms because he knows they hide all their shit there. Whilst people pretend to be happy on the outside, they are most definitely not on the inside. And all of them want to keep it that way, like Lottie did, like Louis does. So next to a full tube of toothpaste and some hair ties, there's usually bottles with pain numbing stuff hidden away.

Louis mindlessly touches the little orange bottles, although there aren't a lot. Some vitamins, mouthwash...a brand new bottle of lube, whatever it's doing in there. And then, as his fingers curl around the painkillers, his throat gives a little squeak. Screwing it open, he takes out five. Harry won't notice because it's nearly untouched, which means he's not using it...so he won't find out that some of them are gone. Whatever . If he finds out maybe he'll think he took them, if not, Louis will just lie and say he wasn't feeling well.

Putting the bottle back in place, and closing the cabinet with a soft clink, he swallows them dry like he usually does. One by one, they slide down his throat. He tries not to cringe at the feeling of them getting a tad stuck. His Adam's apple bobs, forcing them to slide into his stomach.

He sighs, blinking at his reflection in the mirror. What he's seeing is a ghost. Pale skin, bloodshot blue eyes, hollow cheeks. There is stubble on his jaw and above his upper lip. Louis scrubs at it, thinking he really does need to shave when he gets back to Lottie's. He looks like some homeless person.

Louis can't fool himself, saying it's caused by lack of sleep, because he might not have gotten eight-hours of beauty sleep but the hours that he did manage to close his eyes and sink into a wonderland full of fluffy dreams were peaceful. He's not really eating healthily, but when has he ever? Same goes for the drugs, nothing new. But still, his reflection matches how shitty he feels, as if he's living some unhealthy lifestyle, hm. He doesn't understand and has absolutely no desire in figuring it out.

When he's done in the bathroom, he slips back in the bedroom, pulling on his jeans from yesterday, trying to be quick and quiet so he doesn't disturb the sleeping boy in the mess of the angelic cloud-bed.

His stomach flutters when his gaze lingers on the softness of Harry's face, then he sighs to himself, padding through the hallway. He drags his feet down the stairs, picking up the cigarette pack from the coffee table, eyeing their still half full mugs from yesterday. After they had cleaned themselves up and taken a short nap, they had gone downstairs, snuggling close on the sofa with mugs of aromatic tea and watched the first part of Sex in the City.