Color Outside The Lines || l.t.

Chapter 6 - Moving On

“I can’t believe you haven’t decorated your house yet, Louis!” Naomi said as she looked around the living room.

It had just been a couple days after our visit to my mum’s gravestone, and Naomi came to our house for the first time after her trip.

“Decorate for what?”

“Christmas!”

Louis looked at her like she’d gone crazy. “It’s only December 1st. What are you, the holiday nazi?”

Naomi cocked her head slightly and narrowed her eyes. “Ha ha, very funny. I’m sorry, but Christmas is my favorite time of the year and my family always decorated the day after Thanksgiving.”

“It’s your favorite time of the year? Oh geez, I’m never going to hear the end of this.”

Naomi put her hands on her hips. “Just tell me where your decorations are and I’ll set it up for you. You won’t have to lift a finger.”

“Oh, you won’t need to worry about that.” he said nonchalantly, as he flipped open the paper.

“And why not?”

“Cause Danielle and my mum are decorating their houses.”

“So yours can’t join the club?” she questioned.

“Well, we always celebrate Christmas at one of their houses, so I don’t see what the big deal is.”

“And what about Tommy?”

Louis took a sip from his orange juice. “What about Tommy?” he repeated.

“How is he supposed to get into the holiday spirit when his father is the Grinch who stole Christmas?”

He grinned. “You’re a real hoot.” he said. “And besides, when Tommo isn’t here, he’s at one of their houses anyway. So don’t worry. He gets his annual dose of Christmas cheer.”

“Which is more than I can say for you.” she said as she walked off.

“Holiday Nazi!” he exclaimed as she watched her walk away. She turned in her tracks and walked back over to him.

“So tell me this. Where are you celebrating Christmas this year anyway?” she asked, moving the open newspaper down with her hand so he could see her face.

“You really do love this holiday, don’t you?” he asked as he looked at her. “But we’re celebrating it at my mum’s this year, if you really must know.”

“Hmm…” she hummed.

“Hmm what?”

“Oh nothing.” she said as she slowly made her way into the kitchen. He watched her suspiciously as she walked out of the room and went back to his paper.

In the kitchen, Naomi pulled out her phone and dialed my grandmother’s number.

“Oh, hi Johannnah."

My father, who heard this, immediately got up from his chair and bounded into the kitchen.

“Naomi?” he asked when he entered. “Naomi, you better not be doing what I think you’re doing.” Louis said as he stepped around the table which is in between the two of them, trying to get closer to her.

“Oh, I’m fine. How are you?” she said into the phone, keeping a watchful eye on Louis and a safe distance away from him.

“Naomi, this better just be a friendly conversation, or so help me God.” Louis said as he continued to rotate around the table.

“Listen Johannah, I heard that you were planning on having Christmas at your house this year?”

Louis shook his head hard at Naomi mouthing the word ‘no’ repeatedly.

“Well, I know you have a lot on your plate, so Louis decided to volunteer his house for Christmas this year!”

“Naomi Carter!” Louis exclaimed.

She stuck out her tongue, teasing him. “I know! I was surprised too!”

Louis tightened his lips into a thin line. He advanced toward her with his open hand, wanting the phone.

“Ok! Well, I’ll see you on the 25th!” She laughed into the phone as she stopped moving. “Alright, bye!” She noticed Louis' hand and said with a smile, “Oh wait. I think Louis wants to talk to you. Hang on.”

She held the phone out for him and he snatched it out of her hand.

“Mum? Mum?” he said into the phone. He took the phone away from his ear and looked at it. “She hung up on me!”

“She hung up right after I said ‘bye,’ silly!” she said as she grabbed her phone back.

“You’re mean.”

Naomi’s nose twitched as she sniffed the air. “What’s that I smell? Could it be the sweet, sweet essence of victory?” she asked with a smirk.

Louis bit his lip. “Why do you insist on getting under my skin?”

“Why do you insist on being Ebenezer Scrooge?” she retorted.

“I just… don’t do holidays anymore. I mean Abby was the one who took care of decorating for Christmas. I just feel like if the family comes here for Christmas, and we jazz the place up for it… it’ll be like, I’m moving on.”

“Louis, you’re supposed to move on.”

“Who says?”

“So you’re just going to stay like this for the rest of your life? Not celebrating holidays and not moving on? You’re just going to stay in this rut, without any intention of getting out?”

“Yes, yes, and yes.” Louis said, answering all of her questions.

“You live a sad life, Louis Tomlinson.” she said with a slight shake of her head.

Louis shrugged. “I have nothing to prove to you or the rest of the world. The heart wants what the heart wants, and my heart wants Abby back.”

“Fine.” Naomi simply stated, in a tone which made it seem like my father was a lost cause. “Do you want me to call your mom and cancel the plans?”

“Yes.”

Naomi rolled her eyes and opened her phone. “It’s too bad, she sounded really happy when I told her you were hosting it. It might break her heart.” she said as she pushed some buttons and put the phone up her ear.

Louis sighed and took the phone away from her ear, closing it in his hand.

“Ok, you win. Go decorate and cook and bake or whatever you need to do for this thing. But I just want you to know that I’m not helping. I don’t want to take part in anything that Abby was once in charge of.”

Naomi rolled her eyes again but managed to smile. “You’re so stubborn, but thank you.”

She excitedly picked up the phone and dialed a number, putting the phone back up to her ear.

“What are you doing?” Louis asked.

“Well, someone has to take us shopping!”

“Us? I told you I’m not going.”

“I wasn’t talking about you!” Naomi said. “Oh hey Johannah, it’s me again. Do you think you could take Tommy and me shopping? We need some Christmas essentials.”

Louis shook his head as he sat back down in his chair. He opened the paper so it covered his face before muttering “Holiday Nazi.”

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“Are you excited to help me decorate, Tommy?” Naomi asked me as we brought the final shopping bags into the house.

I finished waving bye to my grandmother before turning to her. “Yeah!”

“Awesome.” she said. She looked around the house. “Hmm I wonder where your father is, his car wasn’t in the garage.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I dunno. Probably at the studio or somethin’.”

A smile slowly formed on Naomi’s face. “Oh Tommy, that’s perfect! We’ll make it a surprise! Once your father sees our decorations, his heart of ice will melt away!”

“Won’t he die if his heart melts?” I questioned.

Naomi smirked. “You are too smart for your own good, mister.” We walked into the family room, where the bare plastic tree was set up in the corner. Naomi set the bags down with the others and gazed at the tree. “Do you want to start decorating it?”

“Mmhmm!” I hummed.

“Okay! I guess we start with the ornaments. It’s too bad we don’t have any of the old ornaments your mom used to hang up.”

“Hey! I know where those are! They’re in the attic!”

“Really?” Naomi asked. “Well lead me to the attic then, Tommo.”

We both bounded up the step and I stopped in front of my room and pointed up to the string dangling down.

“Can I come with you?” I asked as she pulled down the string and released the ladder.

“I don’t know. If anything happened to you, your father would literally kill me. You better just stay down here.”

I sighed as I obediently stayed and watched her climb up the ladder. When she got up there, it was relatively tidy. Everything was kept in the boxes. The only problem was that there were a multitude of boxes.

“Where do I start?” Naomi said, scratching her head. She read the box labels, searching for anything related to Christmas.

“Old clothes.” she read aloud. “Extra blankets, photographs…”

She stopped in front of the photographs box and pulled it out and onto the floor. It had occurred to her that she was in Louis Tomlinson's attic and snooping through photographs of her teen idol would be too wonderful to pass up.

She opened the box and looked at the contents. She pulled out the first picture: it was a picture of me when I was just born. She smiled as she looked at my tiny body. She pulled out the next picture, a family portrait of my father’s family. She smiled at the family she had gotten to know so well these last couple of months.

The next picture frame held the picture of a lady she didn’t know. It was a black and white photograph of a blonde woman. Her elbows were on the table and she used both her hands to hold her head up. Her smile looked beautiful, flawless… angelic.

“Abby.” Naomi whispered, as she took in my mum’s appearance. This was the first time Naomi got to see what Abby looked like, because my father didn’t seem to have a picture of her around the house; in fact, he didn’t have pictures up in general.

“I can see why Louis would have a tough time letting you go.” she said as she set the picture aside. She reached into the box again and pulled out another framed photograph, this time it was our family portrait: my mum, dad, and I.

She smiled as she looked at our faces. Naomi had never seen my dad smile so big; she didn’t think the muscles of his face were capable of such a feat. But there it was, probably the biggest of all of ours. 

Naomi decided that she should save the attic adventure for a rainy day, and placed the photographs back in their box. She kept the picture of my mum and our family portrait however, and held it in her hands as quest for the Christmas decorations resumed.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a box entitled ‘XMAS’ and smiled. She placed it on the floor and opened it up. Inside were all sorts of ornaments, ranging from unusual to beautiful. There were lights and stockings and garlands and tinsel and everything Naomi could have wanted, all within four walls of cardboard.

“Jackpot.” Naomi whispered.

She placed the two pictures in the box, reclosed it, and carefully stepped down the ladder.

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My father opened the door to find a dark house. Confused, he flipped on the switch in the kitchen. It was then he noticed a note on the kitchen table that read:

“Go to the family room. Leave the lights off.”

Unsure of what lay ahead, he followed the instructions and made his way to the family room. At the entrance to the dark room, he stopped.

“Tommy? Naomi?” he called out into the darkness.

At that moment, the Christmas tree lit up. Naomi and I stood, not too far from the tree. Our faces were glowing. My father stood very still for a moment; maybe it was a lot of information to process, or maybe he was just mesmerized. And then, as if in a daze, he walked slowly toward the tree; I don’t even know if he noticed that Naomi and I were standing right by it.

When he reached it, he raised his hand, letting an angel ornament rest in his palm. I could see the way the Christmas lights twinkled in his eyes.

“It’s like… Abby came down from heaven and decorated the tree herself. How on earth did you get these?” Louis asked, looking over at us for the first time since he came in the room.

Naomi patted my shoulders and I smiled.

“That’s not even the best thing Daddy. Look what else we did!” I said as I ran to the light switch. I turned the lights on, brightening the room.

“Turn around.” Naomi whispered to Louis, pointing past him.

He slowly turned, and faced the fireplace. On the mantle were the two framed pictures that Naomi discovered in the attic: the one of our family, and the other of my mum. He walked over to it, first examining our family picture and then turned his attention to the one of Abby.

“I took this picture myself.” he said as his fingers traced the outline of her face. “And I haven’t seen it since I stuffed it in that box and hid it away in the attic.”

“Well.” Naomi said, as she walked up behind my dad and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I figured a face as beautiful as hers shouldn’t be stowed away in a hiding place. Now, everyone can see her. You know, I didn’t even know what she looked like until now? Why did you hide all of your pictures, even the ones without Abby?”

“It was too hard.” he said as he grabbed bby’s picture and held it to his chest. “It was too hard to look at those pictures and remember the happy times. Every time I would pass by any picture, I would break down and cry. So I thought if I removed them, I’d remove the emptiness I felt.” He moved her picture away from his body and looked at it before placing it back on the mantle. “But you’re right, it’s better if it’s out in the open. I don’t want me or Tommy to forget what she looked like.”

Louis gave a weak smile. “You guys really did a nice job.” He looked back at the tree. “Oh, but you forgot to add the star.”

“Oh well, we were kind of hoping that… you could maybe do that.” Naomi said. “You know, cause neither one of us can reach. But you did say that you didn’t want to help, so if that’s the case, I’ll just go grab a chair or-”

“-No… let me do it.”

Naomi smiled and motioned for me to hand my dad the star, and I did so. He smiled appreciatively at me and stared up at the tree. He glanced back to the mantle, and looked at my mum. With a loud gulp, he turned back to the tree and reached for the top, placing the star carefully on the tree.

“Now, it’s perfect!” I exclaimed as I went to my dad. He squatted down to hug me.

“Thank you for doing this for me.” he whispered in my ear. “Your mum and I love you.”

“I love you both too.” I whispered back.

Louis smiled and looked up at Naomi while we hugged. She smiled at him, knowing that for once his eyes glistened for happy reasons. She turned, and grabbed the bags of unused decorations that we bought and walked out of the room.

Seeing this, my dad whispered “Hey little man, I’ll be right back.”

I nodded as I watched him rush off after Naomi. He followed her into the kitchen.

“Where are you going?” he asked when he saw her. She stopped and turned to face him.

“Oh, well Victoria said she’d pick me up and take me home. She should be here soon.”

“And the bags?” Louis asked, stepping forward, closer to her.

“I bought these before I found out that Abby had everything I needed. I’ll just return them to the store.”

“Oh.” Louis said.

Naomi smiled and said “Okay, well I’ll see you tomorrow when you pick Tommy up from school then!”

She turned to walk toward the garage, only to have Louis grab her arm and stop her.

“Naomi, wait.” he said.

She froze and turned on her heels. She looked at my dad’s face, concentrating hard on the eyes that had shed so many tears and looked as if they were about to shed more.

“I just wanted to say that… you were right. Not doing things just because Abby isn’t here to do them does me no good. I realize now that moving on doesn’t mean I love Abby any less… in fact, if she was in my place, I’d want her to move on as well. I’m sorry about all those times I snapped at you.” he said. “And I also wanted to say thank you. I know I don’t say it enough.”

“It’s okay Louis, really.”

Louis smiled and let go of her arm. “Okay. Well um, good night then.”

“Good night Louis. Tell Tommy good night for me.” Naomi said with a smile as she opened the door and walked outside. As she walked to Victoria’s car, Naomi wiped the teardrop that rolled halfway down her cheek.