it's golden, like daylight » l.s.

four: butterflies on your face

HARRY

Usually, when it was Harry's turn to cook dinner at their apartment, he was done within a couple of hours if not quicker because he chose easy and minimal effort recipes. He hardly ever wanted to cook after a full day of classes, but today, he was taking an exceptionally long time, and that mostly had to do with how much he had on his mind. He had spaced out while chopping the vegetables, nearly cutting his thumb off, and had even forgotten to boil the water before putting the pasta in the pot.

All in all, he was struggling to focus and failing to finish, so when Niall and Zayn walked into the kitchen, ready for dinner, he felt awful. It was nearly 9 and they must have been starving. "Sorry," he said when they joined him. "I'm almost done."

"No worries," Niall said, standing beside him at the counter while Zayn grabbed plates to set the table. "How can I help?

"Can you check on the chicken, please? It's in the oven."

Niall nodded, grabbed the oven mitts, and opened the oven to observe the chicken cutlets Harry put in there over thirty minutes ago. They were probably dry as fuck now, burnt to the crisp. Could he do anything right today? Harry focused on mixing the pasta with the sauce he made, getting more and more annoyed at himself because this wasn't even a hard recipe. It was a simple chicken and pasta dish that would normally take him less than an hour to make. Zayn seemed to have the same thought.

"Didn't you text us that you started cooking three hours ago?" he asked while grabbing utensils and napkins.

"Yeah," Harry replied. "Sorry about that."

"Stop apologizing," Niall laughed, taking the chicken out of the oven. "Everything okay, though?"

Harry shrugged, "Just a lot on my mind."

"Like what?" Zayn asked him.

The alpha wished he could properly open up and tell them how he was feeling, but he really couldn't. Not without outing himself and Louis and their whole pretending scheme. The thing was, he wasn't sure he was pretending anymore...which was — fuck, it was crazy. Somewhere between the beginning of their plan to now, Harry realized he had stopped pretending. To him, it almost felt like he and Louis were really a couple. The lines were blurring each and every day, every time he looked into Louis' beautiful blue eyes and kissed those perfect lips.

Everything sort of changed since the trip they went on for Thanksgiving break. It had started out innocent enough, like waking up cuddled together, but then they slowly started taking it further and further until their last day when the two of them woke up hard. Harry allowed his alpha to completely take over, scenting, marking, and kissing Louis, who was so soft and pliant beneath him. His slick smelled divine, like the most beautiful roses covered in honey. Just the thought made his mouth water now, and he tried to snap himself out of it.

It wasn't working. It hadn't worked in the days following their trip. He was entranced by the omega. At times, he found himself looking through his phone at the pictures they took together, zooming in on Louis' face and his adorable expressions. Harry wasn't sure what was happening, but the one thing he knew was, his feelings for Louis were no longer just platonic.

He just wasn't sure if Louis felt the same way. After all, when Nick interrupted them, the omega claimed that everything that happened was because of their biology and that was it. Louis felt that they just got swept up in the moment and it didn't help that they'd been so touchy-feely because they were pretending to date. Harry called the bluff, but he didn't say that. He just agreed with Louis and kept it moving.

In the end, he smiled meekly at his friends. "Just thinking about Louis," he admitted. That was a safe enough comment. Louis was his "boyfriend." Of course, he would be thinking about him.