The War Within Us

Chapter 4

The next morning was a clouded one, as he opened his bedroom door at exactly 7:30 the door in front of him remained closed. Harry frowned and walked out his room to meet Liam and Ed standing next to Ed's door.

"Louis already left today." Liam said to Harry.

"Like a care." He did care though.

The three of them waited for Niall and Zayn who came out of their rooms a couple of minutes later.

"I fucking hate mornings." Niall grunted. "Where's Louis?" He asked looking around, other students filling the corridors and walking past them.

"He already left, said something about going to see Cobalt, he seemed to be in a mood." Liam explained.

"I wonder why..." Zayn murmured, gently elbowing Harry on the ribs.

Niall looked at them. "Oh yeah!" He laughed. "You've got to do that song with him, don't you?" He continued laughing.

"Oh yeah, heard about that! When are you guys singing?" Ed said brightly.

"What the fuck? Has the whole school heard about this or something?" Harry's morning couldn't get any worse.

"It's quite the talk of the town, as it appears." Ed replied, his face shrugging slightly with an apologetic look.

"Great. That's just splendid." It seemed like there was still room for the whole day to go to shit.

"When did you say you were singing?" Niall asked.

"I didn't say." There was a long beat of silence between the five boys, until Harry gave in. "Tomorrow during music class." He rolled his eyes.

Niall laughed. "Oh this is going to be amazing."

"Fuck you, Niall!" Harry tried to be angry, but he could only laugh at the absurdity of the situation.

*

Harry's day had gone by relatively quickly, damning everyone in the school, as it seemed, Ed wasn't even half wrong, the whole school had heard about their little show in music class and their performance to come. He tried to ignore everyone as much as possible without seeming like a complete prick. Every chance he got he looked for Louis, but that day they didn't have any classes together and he was nowhere to be found during free period or lunch.

At dinner when he walked into the dinning hall he scanned the room, trying to find arctic blue eyes amongst the crowd. He didn't find them. He queued up and ordered his food, Chow Mein noodles with a side of vegetable gyozas, once his food was ready he picked it up and brought to their table, the tables were free for anyone to sit wherever they wanted, however, different groups preferred different tables and it seemed everyone had their routine set, when he sat down, Zayn and Liam were already eating and whispering and giggling to each other, Harry could see Niall in the pick up queue.

"What are you two talking about?" Harry said while sitting down, biting in half a gyoza.

"What? Nothing." Zayn pulled slightly away from Liam and cleared his throat.

"Okay..." A confused look set on Harry's face as he looked between the two boys.

None of them said anything else, and continued eating, until a few minutes later, when Niall sat at the table.

"Who's died?" He asked. And the three boys looked at him, tilting their heads to the side. "You're all quiet." He munched on his food.

The conversation picked up quickly after that, Harry mainly nodded and ate, not paying much attention. When he finished, he stood up and grabbed his tray with the plates on top of it.