You Can Hear It In The Silence

Chapter 20

Harry silenced his alarm and tried to orientate himself. None of it seemed to make sense. First, he realised he was in his childhood bedroom. Then realised that the person in his arms was, in fact, the same person who had been ignoring him for days. The thing that made the least amount of sense and took the longest to work out was why the fuck he set his alarm so bloody early.

Louis' birthday.

Luckily, Louis had gotten pretty good at sleeping through Harry's alarms, and Harry had become an expert in detangling himself from Louis while not waking him up. He threw on some track pants and a hoodie, did a wee, and went down to the kitchen.

Anne was already in the kitchen, waiting for him like they'd planned. She'd already pulled out what must have been every baking ingredient and utensil she owned and had placed them on the counter for him. "How'd you sleep, darling?" She asked as she kissed his cheek.

Harry rubbed his eyes and leaned against the bench opposite her. "Fine, I guess." He had not slept fine. It had been past midnight before he fell asleep, Louis had come in around three, and he doubted he'd been back asleep before four. Now it was five-thirty.

Judging by the look she gave him, he knew she did not think he slept okay. She looked like she was going to lecture him.

"I know, mum," he said with a sigh. "I'll try to nap or something today."

"It's just I worry about you," she said. It was much less grating to see her say the words than to hear them over the phone.

"Do you?" he asked. "I've never noticed. Why haven't you ever told me?" He pushed off the bench and kissed the top of her head. "But I'm fine."

She nodded, not seeming convinced, and Harry knew he would be forced to nap later. Although, given how emotionally and physically exhausted he was, he wouldn't put up much of a fight.

"So what should we start with?" she asked him.

He looked at everything she'd placed on the counter. "Cake? That will take the longest, and it'll need to cool down before I can decorate it."

"Good idea. And we want that done before Louis wakes up."

Harry laughed. "We have at least four hours until that happens. More likely five."

With a soft smile, his mum stood back a little to look at him. Harry was sure that she'd noticed the fondness in his voice, but he was way too tired to care. "Did you have a flavour in mind?" she asked.

"Well," Harry started - he'd given it thought in the early morning hours when he'd been comforting Louis - "I don't really know if it's possible, but I was thinking, maybe, peanut butter?"

"A peanut butter cake?"

"Everyone likes peanut butter." He tried to bite back a grin but barely succeeded.

"Oh-kay." She tilted her head and seemed to study him for a moment. Then she said, "I'm sure we can find something. Why don't you have a quick google while I check if we actually have peanut butter?" She handed him the iPad she kept in the kitchen just for recipes.

"It's definitely a thing," he said after he googled and multiple recipes came up. He scrolled through them. "Do you think we should make the actual cake peanut butter flavoured, or just the icing and filling? Should we have chocolate as well? Do you have chocolate?"

His mum placed a large container of peanut butter in front of him. "Of course I have chocolate," she said. "What do you think he'd prefer?"

Harry continued looking through the recipes. "It seems like most of the real cakes, like what you'd have as a birthday cake, have peanut butter filling rather than the cake being peanut butter. Most of the ones where is cake is actually flavoured peanut butter seem to be made in a tray."