Harry
Their rambling voices swelled from the front room. I glanced back at Schuyler, a tiny smile adorning my lips.
She looked so frightened. Her shirt was rolled up, exposing her ghastly scrape to cold air. I took a billowed breath, attempting to push down the image of her bloodied back, smeared with hot red.
Liam was the first to speak coherently among their jumbling voices.
"Hi Harry! Why'd Louis call us so randomly? I was trying to grocery shop with these pricks, but then they broke three cartons of eggs and Niall knocked over a cereal box display. Then we got your call, and just kind of headed out. So for dinner, maybe we could just have some of the eggs in the cartons Zayn didn't break."
"It wasn't just me! Niall broke them as well!" Zayn interjected, laughter humming in his heavy accent.
Dimples dug into my cheeks at the sight of their oblivious mirth. Niall's laughter was infectious.
Bounding towards us, Louis skidded in front of me.
"I have the medecine, Harry. Oh and I grabbed the bandaid wrap thing to cover it."
Liam stared at the tube of medicine in Louis' hand.
"Who's hurt, Harry?"
His question stared me in the face, looming imposingly.
"I - erm - it's rather difficult to explain. Louis, care to help?" My voice fell to a hush, gesturing imploringly at Louis.
He tucked in the corner of his lip, biting the soft pink.
"Well, uh, perhaps it's better if we just showed you lads. Just - just don't act shocked and just don't act out of the ordinary."
Liam's face was melded to a mask of concern, while Niall was still attempting to contain his bouts of laughter from erupting. A frown sat upon Zayn's lips.
"Everything alright with you two?"
"Yeah just come on, it's kind of complicated." I responded, turning on my heel before he could catch the glimpse of sadness flooding my eyes.
I was the first to reach the kitchen, wincing when I saw Schuyler wiping hurried fingers under her eyes. She had never looked so bare before. A sudden urge to shield her from the other boys welled in me, drowning out my rational thought.
Her huddled figure looked so broken, strewn in pieces, and pasted together in jumbled cracks.
"Hi." A smile touched my cheeks. "I have the medecine for you."
She bobbed her head.
"Okay, thanks." Her words flatered at the end, dimming to a crackling whisper.
I felt a blow to my heart. Schuyler sounded as if she was fighting her hardest to suppress tears. I slowly stepped aside.
"Erm, Schuyler, these are our other friends. They live here too."
