You And Me - A Collection of Les Twins One Shots

Without You

Summary: Larry's year without Laurent and what he learned from it.

1 - Don't trust anyone, not even the people you love.

Larry doesn't like to talk about it and be told, he doesn't remember all too well.

It's like his brain decided to cut a good chunk of those memories and it's probably better that way because he'd die happy never thinking or talking about that part of his life again. In fact, Larry would sell his soul, to erase whatever he still remembers of that year, but life doesn't work like that and a few of those moments got branded into his core forever.

The first day of the miserable 349-day-long hell, he knows like the back of his hand, almost to a point where he can recite what everyone said to him. Even today, when Larry closes his eyes, he can still see the pitiful looks his sister gave him and feel the way she clutched his hand on the ride home, trying to fill the huge, gaping hole in Larry's heart and failing to provide a comfort that nobody in this car knew how to give to him.

"Get a fucking grip, man." His brother glared at him from the driver's seat, already fed up with Larry's tears. "It's not like he died."

"Leave him alone," their mother cut her oldest off harshly, not giving an ounce of room for further protests. "I don't want another word about this. Not to me, or Larry. He has a right to be upset."

The words barely even registered in Larry's grief-stricken brain, but he caught just about enough of it to twist his lips in indignation. 'Thanks, mom. Thanks for your concern in the face of the damage YOU have caused.'

Despite the hypocrisy of his mom's words, Marc snapped his mouth shut as he navigated through the busy roads that led them back to Sarcelles, rendering them all in tension-filled discomfort with only Larry's hitched breaths to occasionally break the silence.

"At least you won't have to share your shit anymore," Marc commented, never one to know when to keep his mouth shut. "If I was you, I'd be happy."

"That's enough! What did I just say?" their mother shrieked but Larry wasn't even listening. He felt bereft. Wounded. As though someone had reached deep inside of him and stolen something vital from him. Laurent was just... GONE. For thirteen years, they'd never spent more than a few days apart and now Larry was supposed to go a whole year without his other half. Even the thought of not being able to see his twin for that long made fresh tears well in his eyes.

Noticing Larry's pain, his sister tightened her hold on his hand.

"It's gonna be okay," she said as Marc pulled up in the driveway of their home, with the clouds hanging ominously over their neighborhood like they were grieving along with Larry. "You'll get used to it."

Larry wanted to laugh at that because he really, really didn't think anyone understood the implications of what they had done. He felt like someone had violently torn him in half and tossed the other half of him into an airplane. How can anyone get used to that? To feeling incomplete?

Larry pulled his hand out of his sister's hold and tried to suppress the sudden surge of frustration because none of them understood him. And the only person who knew what he was going through was currently in an airplane, on his way to another continent.

Feeling drained and slightly dizzy, Larry fumbled with the handle before languidly unfolding himself from the car. He wiped at the cold tear tracks on his cheeks and stared at the house that looked dauntingly down on him, filled to the brim with Laurent's clothes in their closet and his favorite spot at the dinner table, and about a million other things that were a painful reminder of what Larry just lost for an entire year.