Overboard

Chapter Twelve

*Harry’s P.O.V*

Kendall’s body slumped in my arms and she wiggled down to the floor, wrapping her arms around her shaking frame and trying to keep her sobs quiet. Louis wrapped his arms around me and buried his head against my neck, warm tears splashing against my skin.

“I’m so sorry,” the doctor said quietly.

His words confirmed it for me, and I held Louis tighter, my slender fingers digging into his arms as I bit back my own tears. A break started in the constant tone and my heart tugged as I rose my head slowly out of the crook in Louis’s shoulder. The heart monitor had started again, a slow, blissful beeping that made my knees weak.

“What? Ho- how is that happening?” one of the nurses gasped, reaching forward and pressing two fingers under Niall’s jaw.

Her eyes widened and I felt my heart skip a beat. She looked at the doctor who was staring at the machine, dumbfounded.

“His heart’s beating,” the nurse confirmed.

“Oh my god,” Louis sobbed, fisting my shirt in his hands and taking deep breaths.

“We need to get him stable and ready for the operation, Doctor Avia?” one of the other nurses said, gently shaking the clearly shocked doctor who blinked a few times and nodded.

“Right, get this out of here and you guys, I know he’s your friend but you staying in here doesn’t help him,” Doctor Avia said, raising his eyebrows at the five of us who were slumped around the doorway.

“Of course,” Zayn mumbled after a few moments silence.

I tightened my grip on Louis as we helped Kendall to her unsteady feet, then we were hurried into the hall as Niall’s bed was wheeled out of the room.

My heart was still racing, not over the fact that I’d seen my brother die. Not my real brother, no, but he may as well have been, I loved him with my whole heart and seeing his heart stop beating had made me feel so powerless. If that were to happen to Niall again, or Liam, or Zayn, or god forbid my Louis, I wouldn’t be able to do a thing but stand back and watch them die, and that scared me so much. I always said I’d protect the boys, even though I was the youngest of them all, I still felt the need to protect them, and like I was the older brother in a way, but knowing that there were some things I just couldn’t protect them from made my stomach churn.

“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Louis gasped, his hand flying up to his throat.

Before I managed to find something for him to empty his guts into, he doubled over and coughed out the tiny remains of his empty stomach and a scattering of blood.

“Louis,” I said cautiously, placing my hand on the small of his back.

He stayed bent over for a few moments, his hands braced on his knees, taking deep breaths.

“I’m so tired,” he whispered, slowly straightening up and sagging against me.

“It’s okay baby, a couple more steps until an uncomfortable sleep,” I said gently, guiding him to the end of the hall where there was a scattering of plump armchairs.

Louis fell into one of them, his hand lingering on his abdomen. Zayn sat in the seat beside him and Louis folded himself over the chair to rest his head on Zayn’s lap.

Kendall pulled her legs up under her chin on one of the further seats and hid her face. I’d talk to her after I got Louis’s stomach cleaned off the glistening sterile floors. I walked back to the nursing station and alerted one of the exhausted looking nurses of the mess, and with a heavy sigh one she grabbed a mop.