Grey Hairs - l.s

Grey Hairs

Content warnings for very brief mentions of eating disorders, suicide, shootings, alcoholism, grief, and other difficult topics. Take care.

Third Person POV:

Louis lets out a boisterous laugh as he spins Harry around, the music playing reminiscent of beautiful memories, the pair dancing around on the set of the music video of the very song that played, almost sixty years past.

"Tonight, let's get some," Harry sings to Louis, "and live while we're young!" Louis joins in, the pair singing the ending, Louis with significantly more difficulty. His voice and breathing had suffered badly from the twenty-odd years of heavy smoking when he was younger.

"Seems odd, doesn't it?"
"What?"
"We sang that song, and yet I've never felt so old. The other day I had to set a reminder in my phone to take my vitamins." Harry mumbles, sorely rubbing his neck.

"Hazza, darling, you're still a sprightly young fellow, " Louis assures him in a posh tone, wrapping his arms around the taller mans' neck. 
"Besides, we don't need to be young, we're in love, and that's enough."
"You know, you're such a sap."

Louis groans, collapsing into the armchair. "Yes, I'm the sap, Mr. 'the moon knows we're in love'."
"Hey, you read those fanfictions too." Harry responds defensively.
"Yeah, but I didn't let the fans know." Louis replies with false derision.

The pair continue the gentle banter, Harry eventually taking a seat on the lounge beside the armchair. He grips Louis' hand gently, running his thumb back and forth across the tattooed fingers.

"I got a call the other day. From Khai."
"Oh?"

Zayn had passed away last month; lung disease caused by smoking. That left, of the boys, Harry, Louis and Liam. Niall had been killed, a great many years ago, by the carelessness of a drunk driver. Himself, his security, his girlfriend Amelia and his driver had all been dead on impact, when he was just thirty-two. Harry and Louis hadn't seen him in nearly four years when he died. 

"The funeral, it's next week. She wants us there; Liam's going."
"Of course. Yeah."

Zayn and Louis, though they'd had conversations here and there, had never been the same after Jay's death. Louis hated to hold the grudge, but he couldn't help it; Zayn had hurt him far more than anyone else.

Harry and Louis were not oblivious to the fact that they were attending a great many funerals. After Jay, Robin and Fizzy, the firsts had been Maura Gallagher, then Geoff Payne, both of old age. Niall. Anne, breast cancer. Taylor Swift, a close friend of Harry's, was shot dead in her home by an anti-women extremist, her body found beside her fiance's, Joe Alwyn. Ed Sheeran drank himself to death after two years without his blonde best friend.

The list expanded; family, friends. Mark Tomlinson, old age. Daisy, the young girl, took her own life when she was thirty; the note she left explained she couldn't live without her mother, sister and father. Louis' best friend, Stan, had a heart attack in his early sixties. Desmond Styles died of age, and was shortly followed by Dan Deakin, also old age; Troy Austin, cancer, though Louis refused to attend that funeral. Gemma Styles passed in her sleep. Ashton Irwin was caught in a bushfire in his Australian hometown, Hornsby.

Harry and Louis knew that they couldn't be far behind; some of their famous friends losing their lives at such a young age made them realise they weren't invincible; in fact, the fame could be their downfall. Death after death; over the span of fourty years, they, between them, attended nearly as many funerals, the numbers ticking up as they grew older.

Although it seemed tragic, it was the inevitable. And the pair certainly knew they weren't going to waste any time running from a fate they couldn't escape.

A great many years of their youth had been wasted in suffering, and now was the only time they had to get it back. They danced, though badly. Sang and painted and drove about and visited the 5SOS boys in Australia. They spent time with Liam, Bear and Khai, along with their own kids, Freddie and Darcy. They met Lottie, Phoebe, Doris and Ernest for dinner every fortnight, and hosted a big family and friends Christmas every year.

They ran charity drives and organised pride marches, though many times one or both was not well enough to attend. They used Harry's tour paychecks to help fund cancer research, and hosted fundraising events for frontline emergency service workers. 

Louis and Harry wanted to savour every moment, do everything they could. Though Harry believed in some kind of spiritual being, he wasn't sure what lay beyond life. And Louis; well, he was downright pessimistic.

"Either there's nothing, zip, you live and you die, or I'm ending up in hell and you in heaven and we have to spend our afterlife apart."
"Louis, you wouldn't go to hell."
"I'm a dickhead, Harry. I love you, but don't lie to me." Louis had said flatly. Harry quietly agreed that he was often ruder than necessary, but the thought of being apart from Louis bothered him nonetheless.

As the pair sat beside one another, talking quietly, the old band music still playing, both were happy. They'd lost a great many friends and family, but they had each other. And though Harry struggled to stand once he'd sat, and Louis' tattoos were folded and ruined by the wrinkled skin, neither minded, for they were together. Louis didn't care that his joints ached and his breaths were difficult, nor did Harry care that his muscles ached from overuse when he was younger, and he could no longer prance around like he used to on tour.

The grey hairs were merely a signal of their physical age, not of the young love that was still buried in their hearts. And no matter how much they aged, the feeling towards one another would remain; both knew that much with all the certainty in their hearts.

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how was that?
i wrote this in 60 minutes and didn't edit so its probably crap but anyways lol

-a xx.