Purge (Larry Stylinson au)

Chapter 27

Two months later

"You ready for today?" Harry asks from where he's sitting on the floor. He's wearing just his boxers. He was too lazy to get dressed that morning.

Louis looks up quickly from the bed, eyes wide. "What do you mean?" he asks a little too quickly, fingering the fabric of his oversized t-shirt.

Harry raises an eyebrow. "We're completely liberating the last of the concentration camps today. You didn't forget, did you?"

"Oh," Louis shakes his head. "Right. Um, yeah I'm ready. I'm happy it'll finally be done."

"Me too," Harry says, holding out his arms. Darcy smiles at him from where she's sitting on the floor in front of him. She squeals a little and crawls happily into his arms and Harry picks her up and cuddles her for a bit before putting her back on the ground. 

"You know," Harry says, "I really didn't know how bad the camps were until we started going out and freeing them all. But now... I feel really bad that we never did anything for them before."

Louis looks at him sadly, fidgeting with his fingers. "You can't think that, Haz. What's done is done. The important thing is that we're helping them now."

"Yeah," Harry nods. "You're right."

Harry keeps watching Louis as he stares at his hands. Harry thinks he looks beautiful. His blue eyes are bright and he's still got that soft look on his face that he has in the mornings after waking up. His hair is mussed with sleep and his lips are formed in a pout. 

Harry's eyes trail from his face to the contours of his neck and the shadows of his sharp collarbones, exposed from the wide neckline of the oversized t-shirt he always wears to sleep. It hangs loose of his body, almost like a dress, and that's mostly because it's was originally Harry's. 

Louis's sitting cross-legged on the bed, hunched over with his elbows resting in his lap. He's only wearing his boxers under the shirt and Harry has to look away before he's caught staring at Louis's legs.

Luckily, Darcy crawls over to him then, a big, slobbery smile on her face and her favorite teething toy (a tiny rubber banana) clutched in her little hand. She stops in front of Harry, who smiles widely at her and leans down to nuzzle her nose with his own.

"Hello baby girl," he coos, bopping her nose lightly with his finger. 

She erupts into a fit of giggles and pushes herself into a sitting position. She waves her banana toy around a bit as Harry makes a few funny faces at her, and then she puts the toy in her mouth, chewing it as drool drips down her chin.

"You're a cutie," Harry tells her in a sing-song voice. "I love you Darcy Lou."

Darcy just looks up at him with her beautiful blue eyes, continuing to gnaw on the toy banana.

Louis gets off the bed then and kneels beside them. He runs his warm hand along Harry's bare back, fingers dancing across the coils of scar tissue and ribbons of bumpy skin left there from the explosion of the Purge base.

Harry leans against him, resting his head on Louis's shoulder as they both smile at their daughter. 

She's getting so old - she's almost six months, and she's already started crawling and teething. Pretty soon she'll be walking and talking and neither of them are ready for her to grow up that fast.

"We have to leave soon," Louis mutters, continuing to run his hand along Harry's back, sending shivers down his spine. "Niall and Zayn will be waiting."

"I know," Harry sighs. "But she's so cute. I don't want to leave her."

"Ella's gonna take good care of her, love," Louis says.