Calm after the Storm

Insights and Opportunities

I am not the only traveler
Who has not repaid his debt
I've been searching for a trail to follow again

Take me back to the night we met
And then I can tell myself
What the hell I'm supposed to do
And then I can tell myself
Not to ride along with you

I had all and then most of you
Some and now none of you
Take me back to the night we met
I don't know what I'm supposed to do
Haunted by the ghost of you
Oh, take me back to the night we met
(The night we met - Lord Huron)

[Louis]

'It's going to be fine Lou. You'll be okay.'

He is reading Harry's answer for the tenth time now. Again and again his eyes slide over the text displayed on his private mobile phone. He snuck into the bathroom when Jake fell asleep next to him and Louis first heard tensely if he really didn't notice anything anymore. As his soft breathing gave way to a snore, he felt confident enough to gradually roll out of bed and sneak out of the room. He tiptoed into the bathroom and quietly pulled open the closet door under the sink, reached into the farthest corner and pulled out the bucket with the cleaning supplies. He had hidden the mobile phone in one of the rubber gloves that was lying under all the bottles with cleaning products. An absolutely safe hiding place because Jake would never clean himself or even touch any of it. Also, he can use it whenever he's pretending to use the toilet, the only time Jake accepts that he's alone in the bathroom.

Louis actually doesn't even know why he wrote Harry in the first place. Why it was so damn important that he knew he didn't love Jake. Because nothing has changed that he firmly believes he deserves all of this or that his plan to take his life has changed. But maybe that's just it - Harry should know that Louis didn't love Jake once he's gone. His plan is to leave Harry a letter saying it was always just him. That he knows for sure how loved he always was by him and Harry can hold onto that. Because Louis sees what shines in Harry's eyes exactly, senses it in the small touches - that Harry feels the same way as himself - and is smart enough to know that it will destroy Harry when the day comes when he gets the message. But Louis is too selfish to let it go. He finally wants that peace. No longer wants to live with the guilty conscience of ending a relationship that meant so much to him, lying to his mother for years, no longer wants to fall asleep and wake up in bed with the monster next to him, doesn't want to live next to him for years and secretly break down more and more about the fact that Harry will never be his again, while watching him perhaps one day fall in love with someone else. Louis just can't take it anymore.

A look at the battery level tells him that he doesn't have to recharge the phone yet and he carefully puts it back into the rubber glove, covers it with the bottles and puts everything back in the cupboard. Tomorrow morning he will take it to work and charge it there. He still can't believe Harry gave him that piece of freedom and he couldn't be more grateful for it. Now if he could find a way to visit Harry at his apartment, everything would be perfect for a moment. Finally hugging his mother again. Although it scares him at this moment to meet Anne. Louis feels insecure, if only because it is apparently so obvious that he is not doing well. That he's too skinny. He doesn't want the people he loves so much to worry about him. The only thing he wants for them is to feel happy.

He also fears that Anne doesn't like him anymore, and looks at him differently after he broke up with her son. And this despite the fact that at the age of 16 he fervently promised to marry her son, loving him so much and there was only Harry for him. Instead, he did exactly the opposite and is now sitting here with his rope tattoo, which snakes accusingly around his wrist and reminds him daily that Louis has failed completely.