Count To Ten (Louis Tomlinson Fanfic)

Chapter 3

Harry's P.O.V.

I took a turn into the hallway with our changing rooms, after the show. Usually I was never the first to come in here but tonight, I really wanted a change of outfit. The second I stepped into the room I looked over at the couch where Louis was fast asleep. That explains why we couldn't find him during the past half an hour or so.

"Hey Harry, did y-" I heard Niall's cheerful voice and I quickly snapped my head towards him with a finger on my lips. "Sshh... he's asleep" I whispered.

I could tell Niall was as relieved as I was. Louis needed a lot of rest and that seemed to be a concerning issue that affected everybody around. The fact that he looks tired made us and the management look bad and it was getting on Simon's nerves at some point. Anyone could tell.

I sat down on an extra chair next to the sofa Louis was on, and just went online to kill the time. Seeing how Niall had the bathroom occupied, there's not much that's left that I could do. I logged onto Twitter to see what the reaction was about tonight's show. Let alone tonight's show, my timeline itself was still filled with concerned tweets about Louis.

"Is he doing alright?"

"Is the manager's too hard on him. Why does he look so tired lately."

"Poor Louis. He look so beat up. I've never seen him so off in my entire time in the fanbase"

Didn't this fucker say something to calm these people down?

I mentally rolled my eyes at him before going into his profile. At an instant I noticed the tweets he had sent to the fans earlier that day.

"Guys, thankyou, for your concern but I'm feeling fine. I'm doing great actually. Can't wait to see you all at the show !!!"

"You guys are truly amazing but please stop with the trending. You're scaring me mum !!"

He said he was fine but he's still getting the same reaction. We need to do something about this.

I tossed the phone over to the stool nearby with a sigh. I know he had been seeing a couple of therapists lately but it doesn't seem to do anything for him. He just keeps getting worse. I got up to my feet and walked over to the small coffee table in front of the sofa. Slowly sitting down on it, I looked over at how oddly still Louis was. Concern was raising my heart beat up to a maximum level as I leaned closer to him.

"Louis?" I whispered lightly and ran my hand over his nose. If it wasn't some sick joke or a prank that he was playing on me, he was not breathing. His chest wasn't rising with the breth and there was no sound of him inhaling nor exhaling. I got down on my knees next to him and grabbed onto his shoulders.

"Louis, wake up" I lightly shook him yet he doesn't seem to respond.

"Niall! Get in here!" I yelled while getting up and sitting down on the small space of the sofa next to Louis. I tapped on the side of his face to get his attention yet he didn't even budge. His hands were ice cold and the more time passed the more dreadful things that I was starting to notice. For starters, he looked a little pale as well. The colour of his skin was taking a very light shade with the time.

"What's wrong?" Niall came rushing into the room with a towel around his waist.

"He's not breathing." I yelled and I felt like laughing so hard at my own words. Is this a fucking joke? I know he's the prankster but there's no way in hell he'd go this far. I could not believe I was panicking over something fucking crazy as 'my best friend was not breathing'. My best friend who was on stage about an hour ago, and was perfectly fine, was not breathing. Am I loosing my sanity?

"He what?" Niall almost screamed and I turned around to face him.

"Get help! Now!" I yelled and Niall held on to the towel and ran out of the changing room yelling about. I turned back to Louis petrified over what I was suppose to do.

"Louis!" I screamed at his face and without letting a simple second pass, he grabbed on to my hand. Well, on the plus side he's still alive. But his grip around my wrist was getting tighter and tighter.

"Louis, gah...that hurts" I muttered trying to remove his fingers off my wrist. My skin underneath his fingers were turning white and so was his knuckles. His eyes were still tightly shut and his eyebrows were knitted. He looked like he was struggling to get out of something but there was very little that I could focus on before he ripped my fucking hand off.

"GET UP LOUIS!" I shouted and with a reflex he quickly sat up, breathing loud and hard. He let go of my hand and I held it up to the light to see how it has already turned to a light shade of blue.

"What the fuck?" I yelled turning back to him and it was obvious how he was as lost as I was. He looked around the room still breathless and holding his chest as if he was choked to death.

"Wha- What happened?" He whispered and it wasn't long for Niall to burst into the room with dozen other people terrified of what might've happened to him.

~*~

"It's called sleep insomnia" We sat with Dr. Sanders as she explained. "I didn't think that was your case cause you kept talking about your incident at the children's home-"

"Sleep insomnia? Is that another fancy word for 'crazy'?" Louis mumbled sitting back.

"It's a sleep disorder. The patients seem to have difficulty in sleeping and tend to wake up several times in the night. However, severe cases might include the patient to stop breathing for a small period of time during his sleep. It's called sleep apnea"

"Oh. Another word for 'crazier'" Louis said in a mocking tone and we all snapped at him. How can be not be taking any of this seriously. He stopped breathing for Christ's sake.

"Right." Louis said sitting up watching us all staring him down until he took it seriously. He closed his eyes tightly and opened them again. "That explains the not breathing part. What about that?" He pointed at my hand with the bandage wrapped around it.

"For that, I can't be much of a help for you. It's a thought deep within you. The only way to get rid of it is a question only you might know the answer to." I could notice how with every passing second she was getting on Louis's nerves. He looked up at her from under his eyes with an expression like he was gonna punch through a brick wall if she didn't stop talking.

"So this sleep insomnia thing....is it curable?" I spoke before he snapped.

"Well, we can try some medication for it"