; 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐯𝐞 | l.s.

vii.

vii.

❝and it's only for the brave.❞

⸻⸻⸻

note; *renamed!* previously titled 'take what you need'! i apologize for the wait but i'm back! and it's the final chapter <3
i am definitely not finished with this lil universe & i plan on writing more one-shots/drabbles from the LIOFTB world, but i think this first story has had enough ups and downs to finally tie it all up (mostly...i kept the ending kinda open so i can continue in other works!)
i really, really hope you've enjoyed this fic!! please let me know if it was alright & if you'd like more of this frustrating, confusing louis/harry and sweet mediator niall and poor oblivious roommate liam.

but with that all being said...enjoy the last chapter, and thank you for reading, as always.

-

"I don't want to talk about it, Louis." Harry had shouted after waking up in Louis' dorm that next morning. His words may have been stern but his voice was anything but. The exhaustion in his tone was clear as day, despite desperately trying to not show it.

"Harry, we have t-"

"Drop it."

Louis dropped it.

Harry left.

So, yeah. You could say things between the pair haven't been great... Not that it had been great before, but it was certainly better than this hostile, touch-and-go limbo they've fallen into. After the dramatic-but-seemingly-amicable crossing of paths in Niall's dorm last month, Louis (naively and desperately) thought that meant they could begin their reconciliation. He clung to the hope that his relationship with Harry wasn't entirely unsalvageable, since Harry had called and visited Louis in the middle of the night. Clearly, he wouldn't have wanted to see him if he hated Louis' guts, right?

Now, though, that optimism is fading as quickly as it came, with the two of them arguing any time they see each other.

-

"I knew I'd get hurt eventually," Harry admits the following Thursday after the millionth time his ex-boyfriend has – accidentally, according to Louis – bumped into him around campus. Harry doesn't believe him. "As much as I wanted to brush it off as my silly insecurities, I knew it'd happen. You were already in uni with an established group of fun friends that you and I both knew were too cool for me. You're fun and outgoing, and I just got in the way of you living out your wild, bachelor years at college."

"Harry- I didn't-"

"I know you didn't mean to hurt me," he finishes the other boy's sentence, "but it happened. Sure, it was my fault, too, for trying to get you to settle down. That wasn't fair of me, but..." He trails off with a shrug, his eyes cast down where he distractedly kicks around a loose pebble in the cement.

"We just... We needed space, H. You had to have seen that too. I know it wasn't only me. We started butting heads in a way we never had before. We were too stressed. You needed to focus on your first year. And I needed to sort shit out. I needed to pull myself together and stop being so freaked out by how in love with you I am. It just wasn't working, y'know, at the time."

"And what? It'd work now? Why?" Harry challenged, his tone growing defensive, "Because you're jealous I fucked Nick? Because you saw me fall apart like a pathetic twat and now you, what, pity me? Huh, Louis?"

Louis just barely succeeds at biting his tongue before he starts lecturing Harry on the difference between  fucking and attempted rape. They don't need to have that conversation. Again. "No, Harry. Because I know what's important now."