You Can Hear It In The Silence

Chapter 19

"Can't believe he trusts you to pack his bag."

Harry looked up to see Niall standing in Louis' doorway.

"Why not?" Harry asked from the floor, surrounded by clothes and their suitcases. "What am I going to do?" He doubted that the bag would leave Louis' room anyway.

"You should not pack any track pants. I'd love to see Louis go five days without them."

Harry laughed despite his current circumstances.

Niall walked in and sat across from Harry, in front of the pile of Harry's clothes. "Excited for Christmas?"

After he placed the shirt he'd just folded into Louis' suitcase, he looked up at Niall with pursed lips.

"So, no improvement then?"

Harry hadn't told Niall much, but he hadn't had to because Louis seemed to be going out of his way to make it clear something was wrong. While still insisting that nothing was. "Not sure how it could improve when he is basically ignoring me."

"You want to talk about it?"

"Nope."

"Can you at least tell me whose fault it was so I know how sympathetic I should be to you?" Niall asked.

That question had been floating around Harry's head for the last few days, and the answer seemed to change every hour. "Neither," Harry said. "Or both." He looked down at the pile of Louis' clothes he still had to sort through. "Or mine, maybe. But also his, kind of. I don't know."

"That was not helpful," Niall said as if Harry wasn't already aware.

Because, on the one hand, Louis was a fully grown man capable of making his own decisions, and he'd repeatedly assured Harry that he'd wanted to have sex.

On the other hand, Harry probably should have known better.

He'd just gotten sick of constantly trying to decide what was best for Louis, and he knew Louis was also sick of it. Everything had been going so well, he'd really thought it would be okay. But he had to question whether he used those things as excuses because he, himself, had wanted to.

As soon as he saw Louis' face after, even before he started crying, he was pretty sure it had probably been the wrong decision. By the time he went to bed that night, he'd never been so sure of anything in his life.

"You taking all these?" Niall asked Harry, motioning to the pile of Harry's clothes. Harry nodded, and Niall started folding a shirt. "He's still coming, though?"

"Apparently," Harry answered. "That's what he said this morning when I asked before he ran out of here." Harry squished down a couple of Louis' jumpers to make room for the other clothes. "Although, he could just be waiting to pull out at the last moment so that I'll go without him." At this point, if Louis told him to go without him, he just would. He'd basically given up trying to talk to him; he'd tried for four days. Harry wasn't going to force himself into his life. He just wished Louis would give him some warning so he could work out how to get to his parent's.

Niall had started a pile of folded clothes next to Harry's bag. "What does your family know about him?"

"That he's a friend."

"That's it?" Niall said.

"Well, it's the truth." Well, it had been the truth. Now, it was like they weren't even friends. "What else would I say?"

He could feel Niall watching him but chose to ignore it. "Wait... you're being serious?"

Harry did look up at him then. "What do you mean? You know that."