Only a Heartbeat Away

Chapter 7

About two hours have passed, Harry is asleep again, Louis' hand was still in tangled in his hair and the rest of the lads were now watching Liam's collection of 'Doctor Who'.  Enjoying the silence after a chaotic morning, the comfortable company was soon interrupted by a banging on the bus's door.

"Boys you will open this bus now!" Sally yelled.

"Sally don't. Just let them look after Harry and call it a day."

"No Paul! This is beyond a joke. I want Mr Tomlinson and Mr Styles separated immediately." Sally continued but the boys unable to hear the rest of the conversation between the angry manager and the fed-up bodyguard, Louis gently removed Harry from his lap and marched toward the bus door before Liam, Niall or Zayn had a chance to stop him.

"Harry will not be going anywhere. He is staying right here with me and the other lads. If you attempt to remove him from my care, I will sue you for emotional abuse and send him home. Which is well within my rights to do so as Harry's legal guardian and husband." Louis said calmly which scared the absolute hell out of the boys. Harry having eventually awoken to the noise being made heard what Louis said and soon realised what Lou's calm demeanour really meant and as quickly as his sick body allowed, he walked up to Louis' back and place his head in-between his shoulder blades and intertwine their hands.

"What are you doing up Bub?" Louis asked quietly as not to disturb the bubble of peace around them. Harry flex his fingers as a response, too tired to verbalise his answer. "Was it my tone?" Harry nodded, "the lads, okay? Apart from being a little scared." again Harry nodded. Louis rolled his eyes but leaned back into Harry's embrace. "How is it when I use this particular tone everyone runs screaming for the hills while you and my mother think it's a wonderful idea to hug me? Hmm." Harry shrugged and placed a kiss on the back of Louis' neck.

"Come on Hazza let's get you horizontal again." Harry hummed as Louis slowly pulled him back towards the lads.

Meanwhile outside of the bus Sally was still arguing with Paul but now with a hint of fear in her voice.

"What the hell was that? He can't address me in such a disrespectful manner!"

"Well, you are interfering with his husband's health." Paul stated crossing his arms.

"What was that tone?" Sally almost whimpered

"Yeah that. We don't actually know. It seems to happen when Louis feels..." Paul trails off as he struggles to explain the emotion that causes this particular reaction in Louis. The only emotion that fits is absolutely fed up, but even that seems to feel like a understatement. "All we know is the look that goes with that tone would make even the Godfather jump. Honestly if Louis wasn't a singer, I would peg him as a crime boss. Anyway, considering the silence from Louis someone has taken Louis' attention off you. My guess it's Harry, so I vote we leave this be Sally." And with that Paul walked away letting the rest of security know that One Direction is all packed up and ready to move out. "Well, I'm not done yet" Sally muttered to herself and proceeded to pull out the bus's master key from her handbag and shoved it into the lock and barged onto the bus, startling everyone on board. Harry immediately sat up and rushed to Sally gently placing his hands on her shoulders and pushing her back towards the open door. Harry's sickly dim eyes locking on to her's, his basically screaming at her "let me handle this. Please." but Sally ignored the boy and simply grabbed on to his arm and proceeded to pull him off the bus, Harry being far too sick to fight back was just pulled along like a dog being taken for a walk, though the more effort Harry put in to not fall over the more he went pale and once Sally had them outside Harry could barely hold himself up, trying with all his strength Harry tried to shake Sally loose, unfortunately in his weaken state couldn't make her budge. Sally managed to get Harry on to the second bus with the band, he immediately fell down into an empty seat and closed his eyes but even then, the band saw how terrified Harry looked. The Guitarist Josh Devine stepped towards Harry with a bottle of water in hand tapping Harry's shoulder to get his attention. With a small smile Harry nodded his thanks and re-closed his eyes. The drummer Jack Last handed josh a blanket which he then threw over Harry and turned to Sally, feeling the Bus start up as well.

"Please tell me you didn't kidnap him?" Josh demanded.

"Of course not. Him and Mr Tomlinson needed to be separated. I achieved that." Sally smugly giggled. Josh rolled his eyes and sat next to Harry in order to keep an eye on him. Everybody could tell Harry was poorly. Sally continued to congratulate herself only for it to be cut short.

"You should have left me there. Why didn't you just leave me there? He..." Harry swallowed thickly, his throat still swollen from all the coughing, his barely contained asthma attack that Louis managed to stop earlier before being placed on his travel ventilator and the rolling nausea that came from being on his proper ventilator, "he's going to go dark! Why the fuck didn't you leave me there?! I could have calmed him down!" Josh quickly noticed Harry's breathing was getting dangerously quick and wheezy and the bus they are on wasn't setup to handle Harry's medical needs.

"Haz, mate calm down. You cannot have an asthmatic complication here." Josh explained pulling out his phone, dialling Liam while glaring pointlessly at Sally while she just looked on with a proud smile on her face, thinking she's won some sort of game. Josh only looked away when the phone connected.

"Liam it's Josh... yeah I've got Harry... yes I'm attempting to keep him calm... how's L... the fuck are you kidding me?! What do you want to do? Liam, we have not... it isn't easy li especially when his breathing... I'll try. Okay... okay. Bye Liam." hanging up Josh put his phone away and looked at the three other people on the bus. "Can someone run the tub to the point it's steaming out the bathroom please? We've got to keep his airwaves clear." Jack nominated himself and stood up from the stool he was positioned on and ran into the little bathroom. Once he came back Josh and the other guitarist Ryan Bragens lifted Harry from his seat and carried him to the bathroom and stripped him down to his boxers. Josh explained to Ryan that he had to talk to Sally and that Ryan and Jack had to stay with Harry and Liam emphasised not to overheat Harry due to the possibility of making Harry's fever worse. Ryan sighed in pure frustration as complete understanding just how dire this situation could become. Josh shook his fellow bandmate's hand and left to have a stern word with Sally who was now sitting next to the driver.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Sally recoiled at Josh's tone and her smug smile fell off her face. "Harry has severe medical problems that we cannot cope with! I want this bus stopped and Harry return to Louis' care immediately! This is reckless endangerment and kidnapping!" Sally squared her shoulders and smiled sweetly at Josh.

"Honey it isn't kidnapping if we are all going to the same place. As for the other issue you seemed to have it all sorted. There is no need to stop the bus." the bus driver Peter Roberts even blinked in shock as he didn't know he had Harry on his bus and a sick Harry at that.

"Miss with all due respect I do not have the equipment necessary on here to deal with the severity of Harry's medical condition. May I respectfully request we listen to Josh and what the hell does he mean by kidnap? You actually didn't forcibly remove Harry from Mr Tomlinson's care, did you?" Sally sat up straight and with a sneer.

"We are not stopping this bus. End of discussion! Mr Styles is perfectly fine he just wants to be a diva. Mr Styles was not meant to be near Mr Tomlinson in the first place, so all of you mind your own business and do your jobs." Sally finalised ending the discussion completely. Peter and Josh looked at each other as they both knew this could end very badly.

"How far to the next venue?" Josh asked the bus driver ignoring the ruthless glare Sally was sending his way.

"Four and a half hours."

Josh languished heavily.

"We're so royally screwed!"